Vain ^Repetitions 

... or ... 

S6e Protestant Meaning 

... of ... 

B att a 

... by ... 

Joseph F. Sheahan 



1901 

15/>e Cathedral Library Association 

123 East 50th Street 
JVetv yorK 



Vain Repetitions 



OR 



ke Protestant Meaning 



OF 



BATTA. 



BY 



* ; • : . ... :•; v 

Rev. Joseph F. SheahAJj; • 



• ••• 



1901. 

THE CATHEDRAL LIBRARY ASSOCIATION 
123 East 50TH Street, 
New York. 




p. 

Author. 

(person). 




CONTENTS. 



CHAPTER PAGE 

Introduction - - - - - - 5 

1. Batta = Poly - - - - - 7 

2. Prop. I. Batta-logia means much speaking - 15 

3. Prop. II. Much speaking is a long speech ... 20 

4. Prop. III. Long prayer speeches condemned, not on 

account of their length, but for another reason - 23 

5. Protestant text unknown to Luther - 28 

6. Calvin the inventor of vain repetitions- - - 30 

7. The invention accidental . _ _ . 32 

8. The true meaning of the text - - - - 38 

9. Summary explanation of text — Public extempore 

prayers condemned - 45 

10. Repetition in prayer recommended - - - 48 

11. Baal and Diana ------ - 51 

12. Parallel passages ------- 57 

13. A little shell game argument ----- 61 

14. Does Batta, literally mean to stammer ? - - 66 

15. Batta, Batto, Bat (t) ----- - 67 

16. Battus the poet ------- 70 

17. Battus, king -_.->-- 72 

18. Was repetition characteristic of pagan prayers? - - 74 

19. The real origin of the Protestant text? - 79 

20. Some new Protestant sins ----- 81 

21. The Lord's prayer impugned - - - « 86 

22. Oriental praying machines - - - 92 



INTRODUCTION. 



In St. Matthew vi-7, we read : 

( 1 And when you are praying, SPEAK NOT MUCH, 
as the heathens. For they think that in their much 
speaking they may be heard." 

The authors of the earliest Protestant versions thought 
that the 44 much speaking" referred to was silly speaking, 
and so put 14 Babble not much " instead (Tyndale, Cran- 
mer, Geneva). 

The authors of the King James version thought that 
the "much speaking" consisted in foolish repetitions, 
and so rendered the text : 4 ' Use not vain repetitions." 

These Protestant renderings, as is evident, are not 
versions but paraphrases or interpretations of the text. 

The opinion that Christ was condemning babbling or 
vain repetition, in Matt, vi-7, originated with Protestant 
scholars. We can find no trace of it prior to the six- 
teenth century. 

In this pamphlet we are looking for the true meaning of 
BATTA, the word which Protestants have rendered 1 ' vain 
repetitions" — and then for the meaning of the text in 
which it occurs. 

My Protestant readers will be surprised when I tell 
them that Christ never condemned repetition of any 
kind, that there is no condemnation of repetition any- 
where in the Scriptures, that the Hebrew prayers, both 
ancient and modern, have nothing reprehensible under 
this head; that although pagan prayers are to be con- 
demned, it is not on account of any repetitions that may 
be found in them. Whether the reasons that I give are 
sufficient and satisfactory, it remains for my readers to 
decide. 

About two-thirds of the matter in this volume appeared 
in the N. Y. Freeman's Journal a year ago. 



VAIN REPITITIONS 



OR 

THE PROTESTANT MEANING OF BATTA. 



CHAPTER I. 
BaTTa = Poly. 

About three years ago I became interested in the Pro- 
testant text, " Use not vain repetitions as the heathens " 
(St. Matthew vi-7), a prohibition that Protestants ac- 
cuse us of violating by reciting the Rosary, the Litanies, 
etc., which abound in repetition. No Catholic author 
that I know of, has .ever given this Protestant text 
much attention, or attempted to show that there is no 
question whatever of repetition in it, unless its implied 
recommendation. In fact, I have found several Catholic 
authors, whilst doctrinally correct, so influenced by 
Protestants, as to use the repetitions of the priests 
of Baal as an illustration of the thing prohibited in St. 
Matthew vi-7, and giving the same old stale, unintelligent 
etymological guesses that, together with the Baal and 
Diana illustrations, are to be found in nearly all Protestant 
commentaries. I have been surprised at the amount of 
sophistry and anti-Catholic abuse to be found in Protes- 
tant works on this text. 

Until the sixteenth century neither Jews, Christians, 
Mohammedans nor Pagans ever saw any harm in repeti- 
tion, nor, with the exception of Protestants, do they see 
it yet. We think that we have perfect liberty, in ad- 
dressing Our Heavenly Father. We may ask Him for the 
same thing in the same or in equivalent words, we may 
repeat His Name and our petitions to Him a definite or 
an indefinite number of times, as often, and even oftener 
than a child does in addressing its earthly father. Some 
Protestants also believe in this perfect liberty in prayer, 
but the majority of them think that there is some divine 
restriction on repetition. 



If they are asked the reason for this strange notion 
(strange to all the world except themselves) they will 
reply: Christ said : "USE NOT VAIN REPETITIONS 
as the heathen," — which we deny. "Why, look in the 
Bible and you will see that He did." In your Protestant 
Bible, it is true, these words are found, but are they a cor- 
rect translation of the words that Christ used? or, rather, 
are they a correct paraphrase or interpretation ?* 

Look in our Catholic Bible and you will find no men- 
tion of vain repetitions ; there you will find this text 
translated: "SPEAK NOT MUCH, as the heathen," 
an altogether different meaning, as I will show later on. 

Repetitions, like many other things, are of three kinds 
— good, bad and indifferent. Prayer to God is good, and 
as a good thing cannot be done too often, the oftener it 
is repeated the better. Prayer to an idol is something in- 
trinsically bad, and each time it is repeated a new injury 
is done to God ; such repetitions are bad repetitions. 
Some people have a habit of repeating some word or 
phrase such as "Great Scott" without any rhyme or 
reason, nearly every time that they open their mouths to 
say anything ; it is merely a foolish habit, which does 
neither good nor harm. Such repetitious are vain or 
useless repetitions. There is no question between us and 
our Protestant friends about the repetition of bad or in- 
different things. Every one will call the repetition of a 
bad thing a bad repetition, and the repetition of a useless 
or foolish thing a foolish or vain repetition, but the ques- 
tion is whether it is bad or useless to repeat a good thing, 
to repeat a prayer to God? Protestants do not, as far as 
I know, at least in their commentaries on our text, accuse 
us of repeating prayers that are bad or indifferent, but 
accuse us of breaking Christ's prohibition, especially by 
repeating too often the prayer, which Christ in this very 
place, taught us to say. To Catholics it appears very lu- 

*" Use not vain repetitions " is a paraphrase, but not a version, giv- 
ing probably the sense but not the form of the original (St. Matthew- 
explained by J. Addison Alexander). Alexander is one of the few 
Protestant scholars who puts it so mildly as to say that the words 
" Use not vain repetitions 1 ' found in the English Protestant version 
give" probably the sense" of Our Saviour's words ; the majority 
speak as though there was no doubt about it. 



8 



dicrous to be accused (of the crime!) of repeating too 
often the Lord's Prayer, but any of my readers who are 
familiar with the plentiful Protestant literature on this 
subject know that one of the heavy charges brought 
against the wicked Romanists is (the sin !) of repeating 
too often the very prayer which Christ Himself taught us, 
and which is therefore the best of all prayers. The fol- 
lowing extracts from commentaries by Protestant scholars 
will show us how they look at this matter : 

14 BATTALOGESETE.— To repeat the same formula 
many times, as the worshippers of Baal and of Diana, of 
Ephesus and the Romanists, with their pater-nosters and 
aves '! i Marvin R. Vincent, in his " Word Studies in the 
New Testament. ' ' ) 

"The repetitions of pater-nosters and aves in the 
Roman Church, as practiced by them, are in direct viola- 
tion of this precept." (St. Matthew, with S.S. Notes. 
Internat. Series, R. Franklin Johnson. ) 

"It has often been remarked that in corrupt Christian 
churches one of the earliest and worst perversions of the 
truth is the adoption of the very error (i. e., using vain 
repetitions) which Our Lord here describes as heathenish, 
and in relation to the very prayer here given to pre- 
vent it." (St. Matthew explained by Rev. J. Addison 
Alexander. 

"In the Church of Rome not only is it carried to a 
shameless extent, but as Tholuc justly observes, the very 
prayer which Our Lord gave as an antidote to vain repe- 
titions is the most abused to this superstitious end, the 
number of times it is repeated counting for so much 
merit. Is not this just that characteristic feature of 
heathen devotion which our Lord here condemns?" 
(Jamieson Lausset «S: Brown.) 

44 Protestants condemn the general use of it made by 
Romanists." ( McClintock & Strong's C\cl. Art. Pater 
Nos/o . ) 

Here we have some good strong anti -Catholic assertions 
that we shall examine more at length later on. Christ 
said something in condemnation of some heathen practice 
in St. Matthew vi 7 which Protestants have paraphrased 
or interpreted ,l Use not vain repetitions, as the heathen." 



9 



Then they put Catholics and heathens in the same box 
and prove to their own satisfaction that we are disregard- 
ing the prohibition of Christ. From what I have read on 
this subject from a Protestant standpoint, I should be in- 
clined to believe that the Roman Catholic heathen is the 
worst kind of heathen. We poor superstitious heathen 
Romanists, thinking that we have perfect liberty to ad- 
dress God when and where and as often as we please, a 
definite or an indefinite number of times, even in the 
very same words, do not know to what " a shameless ex- 
tent " we are perverting prayer until we find it out in 
Protestant books. As none but Protestants are able to 
find their prohibition in St. Matthew vi-7, I hope that 
they will let us off, at least, on the plea of invincible 
ignorance. 

I should like to ask our Protestant brethren for an ex- 
planation of their text. Do the words "Use not vain 
repetitions" mean: Use not repetitions, because repeti- 
tions are vain ? or, do they mean : Use not those repeti- 
tions, which are vain ? If they say the first and condemn 
repetition in itself, they condemn Christ and the Scrip- 
tures, and even themselves, for all men use repetition 
at times. But if they mean : Use not those repetitions 
which are vain, w 7 hat are they? Surely the Lord's 
Prayer, and the inspired words of Holy Scripture, of 
which most Catholic prayers are composed, are not vain. 
Protestants have never been able to agree in telling us 
what they mean by vain repetitions. 

There is another question which I should like to ask 
our Protestant friends, concerning the repetitions which 
they think Christ has forbidden in His Sermon on the 
Mount. Did Christ forbid these repetitions because they 
were wrong ? or, are they wrong, simply because Christ 
has forbidden them ? 

If Protestants think that they are intrinsically wrong 
and forbidden by the natural law, it is a pity that the 
learned Protestant scholars of the last three hundred years 
have not clearly pointed out their intrinsic malice [f 
they think that they are wrong simply because Christ h is 
forbidden them (just as it was wrong for a Jew to eat 
pork, simply because God forbade it to him) Protestants 



10 



should abstain from attacking Jews and Pagans for doing 
what is in itself harmless, and they should also excuse us, 
as we are still unable to find the prohibition which was 
not discovered until sixteen centuries after Christ had 
spoken it. As Protestants are the only ones who are 
aware of its existence, they are the only ones who can be 
guilty of breaking it, and of offending God by doing so. 

The majority of Catholics do not repeat the Lord's 
Prayer oftener than twice a day, at their morning and 
at their evening prayers. Protestants give us credit for 
more devotion than the majority of Catholics deserve. 
This pamphlet, however, is not about how much, or how 
little, Catholics repeat their prayers, or whether they 
repeat them at all, but we are to try to find out if Christ 
ever said anything in condemnation of repetition, whether 
anything like a condemnation of repetition can be ex- 
tracted from the words which He used in His Sermon on 
the Mount (St. Matthew vi-7), or whether the Greek 
words Me Battalogesete can be correctly translated, or 
paraphrased, or interpreted " Use not vain repetitions " ? 

In His introduction to the Lord's prayer, according to 
our English Catholic version, Christ said (St. Matt. 
vi-7) : 

''When ye are praying, SPEAK not MUCH, as 
the heathens. For they think that in their MUCH 
SPEAKING they may be heard. Be not you there- 
fore, like to them, for your Heavenly Father knoweth 
what is needful for you, before you ask him." 

According to the English Protestant authorized version, 
Christ said : 

"When ye pray, USE not VAIN REPETITIONS, 
as the heathen do ; for they think that they shall be 
heard for their MUCH SPEAKING. Be not ye 
therefore like unto them ; for your Father knoweth 
what things ye have need of, before ye ask him." 

It will be noticed that in one sentence these versions 
disagree. The Catholic version has ' 1 Speak not much ; " 
the Protestant, ''Use not vain repetitions. " When ver- 
sions disagree, we must go back to the original. Ac- 



11 



cording to St. Matthew, Christ said : MB BATTALO- 
GESETE. Is the Catholic translation correct, or is the 
Protestant paraphrase correct, or are they both correct, 
i. e., have they both the same meaning? According to 
Protestant authors they both are correct ; ours is a literal 
translation, theirs is a paraphrase of that translation ; 
much speaking, and vain repetition are the same thing. 
They are not. If we split up the compound 'word, 
BATTALOGESETE and arrange the Greek words and 
the two translations in the following way, I think that it 
will be clear even to those who know nothing of Greek 
in what they agree and in what they differ : 

LOGESETE ME BATTA 
(Catholic) : Speak not much 

(Protestant) : Use not vain repetitions 

LOGESETE means, speak ; the Protestant version 
renders it, use, but since use vain repetitions, and speak 
vain repetitions, mean the same thing, we have no fault 
to find with this word. ME means not ; but what does 
BATTA mean ? It means much, as I shall show, but does 
it also mean vain repetitions ? Since BATTA is the only 
word or part of a word about which we disagree, we shall 
put the rest aside and devote all our attention to BATTA. 

Of the origin, or derivation, or etymology of BATTA 
we know nothing. A number of guesses have been 
made, but they are of no value. 

BATTA is not found as a separate word in any of the 
Greek literature that has come down to us. It is found 
in combination with R1DZEIN ( Battaridzein) and with 
LOGEIN (Battalogein). This latter verbis found only 
twice in Greek authors, once in St. Matthew vi-7, the 
text that we will study, and again toward the end of the 
fifth century in Simplicius (Ench. in Epictetus 340 
[212 C] ). It is found in no classic author. In its 
nominal form, BATTATOGIA (much speaking), it is 
also found in a few places. The verb is not given in any 
early Greek lexicon. Since then, it is found neither in 
Greek literature, excepting two places, nor in ancient 
lexicons, we must look for its meaning in the ancient 
translations which were made when Greek was still a 



J2 



living language, and when the word BATTALOGEIN 
was still in use ; but first and above all, we must de- 
termine its meaning in St. Matthew from its context. 
From both of these sources, it is certain that BATTA 
means much, and that BATTALOGEIN means to speak 
much; but neither in ancient translations, nor in the 
context of St. Matthew, nor anywhere in the Scriptures, 
can we find any support for the Protestant text. I hope 
that the reader who does not understand Greek will not 
be discouraged if I introduce another Greek word, POLY, 
which also means, much or many. However POLY has 
been transferred into English and is used in so many com- 
pounds (e. g. polygamous, much married ; polychromous, 
manv colored), that every one should be familiar with it. 
BATTA has also been anglicized, and we have it in both 
its verbal and its nominal form — Battologize and Batto- 
logv ; we have even two English forms, Battological and 
Battologist, which have nothing corresponding to them 
in Greek. These words were introduced into the Eng- 
lish language by Protestants, and have the Protestant 
meaning of BATTA. 

POLY and BATTA are synonyms; they mean much. 
POLY-LOGEIN and BATTA-LOGEIN are also syn- 
onyms, and mean to speak much. POLY-LOGIA and 
BATTA-LOGIA are also identical in sense, and mean 
much speaking. 

Before examining the Protestant text, we must satisfy * 
ourselves that our Catholic translation is correct, which 
ought to be easy, since Protestants admit that it is. J 
shall give a few quotations from Protestant scholars show* 
ing that they consider POLY-LOGIA and BATTA^ 
LOGIA synonyms, meaning, much speaking. 

" (Christ) uses two w r ords (Batta-logia and Poly-logia) 
but they have the same meaning n — Calvin. 

"The explanation of its (Batta-logia) meaning is fur- 
nished by the expression much speaking, Poly-logia, 
which follows." — Lange, translated by Philip SchafF. 

" Batta — . . . the same thing which is subsequently 
called Poly — " Meyer, A Critical Exeg. Handbook of 
St. Matthew. 

Ward in his errata of the Protestant Bible, gives many 



13 



of the anti-Catholic mistranslations in the English Protes- 
tant versions that preceded the King James or Authorized 
version of 1611. One of the erroneous translations in the 
Authorized Protestant version, which is not found in the 
versions made before its time, is "Use not vain repeti- 
tions," (St Matthew, vi-7.) It is true that the Protestant 
translations made prior to it, mistranslate this very text, 
by rendering it u Do not babble," but the particular 
mistranslation that we are now dealing with did not ap- 
pear until 161 1, and hence it is not mentioned in Ward's 
list. We must first be certain that our version, "Speak 
not much " is correct, and then we shall show that ' ' Use 
not vain repetitions" is an incorrect paraphrase, or a 
misinterpretation. It is unnecessary to go to the trouble 
of proving that our version is correct since Protestant 
scholars admit it, but I think it important to give the cor- 
rectness of our version a little more prominence, and I 
shall do so by putting it forward in the form of a propo- 
sition. 



14 



CHAPTER II. 



PROPOSITION I. 

Our Catholic version of Christ's words (St. Matthew, 
vi-7 }, 11 speak not much," is a correct literal translation. 

It will be necessary to keep in mind the whole verse to 
prove our proposition : 

"When you are praying, speak not much (ME 
BATTALOG-) as the heathens. 

" For they think that in their much speaking (POLY- 
LOG I A - they may be heard." 

Protestant scholars in dealing with this text use the 
nominal form BATTA-LOGIA and the verbal form 
BATTA LOGEIN indifferently, for there is no dispute 
about the part of the verb, or about the word in its verbal 
or nominal form, but about the meaning of the word in 
either or both forms, hence for the sake of simplicity and 
to follow the example set for us, we will speak of 
BATTA-LOGIA and POLY-LOGI A, although BATTA- 
LOG in our text happens to be a verb, and POLY-LOG 
a noun. 

Here is our proof in form : 

POLY-LOG I A means much speaking ; 

But, BATTA-LOGIA and POLY-LOGIA mean the 
same thing : 

Therefore, BATTA-LOGIA means much speaking. 

The major, as every boy and girl who has studied Greek 
a few weeks knows, merely states the meaning of the 
Greek word Poly-logia. The minor states the identity 
of Batta- and Poly-, which will be evident to anyone 
who Carefully looks over the text. Protestant scholars 
admit it. The Protestant versions made prior to King 
Jamefl ll&O Affirm the identity of Batta- and Poly-, for 
they translate them both by the same English word. 
They have mistranslated them both, but they have at the 
same time acknowledged their identity by mistranslate- 



1$ 



them both by the same word,* and their identity is all 
that we are asking for in the minor of our syllogism. 

*TYNDALE A. D. 1534— And when ye praye, bable not moche, as 
the hethen do : for they thincke that they shal be herde, for their 
moche bablynges sake. 

CRAMNER A. D. 1539 — But when ye praye bable not moche, as the 
hethen do: for they thincke it wyll come to passe, that they shal be 
heard for their moche bablynges sake : 

GENEVA A D. 1557 — Also when ye pray, bable not much, as the 
heathen do : for they thyncke to be heard for their much babling sake. 

If we look at the translations made prior to the Reformation, not 
only do we find that they translate battalogia and polylogia by the 
same word, but we also find that they use the correct word. All the 
ante-Reformation translations of this text are correct, e. g. 

WICLIF A. D. 1380— But in preiynge nyle ze speke moche as hethen 
men don, for thei gessen that thei be herd in her moche speche. 

If one reads the Fathers in Protestant translations, he may imagine 
that the Fathers thought that repetition was condemned in Matt. 
vi-7. For Protestant translators, thinking perhaps, that the Fathers 
held the same views as themselves, sometimes attribute to them 
statements 'that they never made. The following is a comment of 
St. Gregory on the text (Matt, vi-7), as it is given in a Protestant 
translation : 

" True prayer consists rather in the bitter groans of repentance than 
in the repetition of a set form of words" — (Trans, by Rev. Mark 
Pattison, M. A., Fellow of Lincoln College). 

I looked at the original and found the following : 

" Sed veraciter orare est amaros in compunctione gemitus, et non 
composita verba resonare. 1 ' 

I should translate these words : 

" True prayer consists rather in the bitter groans of repentance, than 
in the resounding periods of an oration.' 1 '' 

By what process can any one get "the repetition of set forms of 
words, 11 from "Composita verba resonare? , ' 

COMPOSITA VERBA means words that have been put together to 
make up a speech or composition. This phrase has no notion what- 
ever in it of repetition. It meiely represents the synthesis of words 
that go to make up the literary production. The delivery of the 
speech or composition is expressed by the word RESONARE. This 
word is also the common ground of comparison between the contrasted 
audible groans of the penitent and the resounding words of the de- 
cl .imer A man's religious views often make him mistranslate a very 
simple sentence. It seems to have made this translator of St. GregOl J , 
impervious to the saint's humor, and unable to see the alliteration and 
the pun in the sentence that he is putting into English. 

* l Sed veraciter orare est amaros in compunctione 
" Gemitus (resonare understood), et non composita 
" Verba resonare." 

16 



About twelve centuries before Luther, St. Jerome made 
the 1 .at in translation of the Bible known as the Vulgate. 
St. Jerome was one of the most eminent biblical and 
Greek scholars of all time. He wrote when Greek was 
still a living language, when Batta-logia in both its verbal 
and nominal form, was still in use, and giving its mean- 
ing in St. Matthew he translates it "Nolite multum 
loqui." Speak not much ; and there is no reason for not 
believing that this is also the translation that he found 
in the Latin versions that preceded his own. Nolite 
multum loqui, is probably the earliest translation, in any 
language, of the Greek words of St. Matthew, ME BAT- 
TALOGBSETE. 

J. I) Miehaelis in his essay on Battology says : See 
the efforts of the ancients in translating the command 
ME B A T T A LOGESETE. The Vulgate and the trans- 
lations previous to St. Jerome without any variations in 
the codices read : Nolite multum loqui (speak not 
much). 

Thi> is not a study in Greek. The reader need not 
know au\ Greek at all, except that the two Greek words 
Batta-logia and Poly-logia are synonyms, and mean much 
speaking. I shall sum up all the Greek that he need 
know, to follow our argument, in this equation : 

Batta-logia = Poly-logia (much speaking), which may 
be abbreviated by eliminating logia (speaking) from both 
sides, leaving \ 

Batta == Poly (much). 

We intend to examine the crop of Protestant sophis- 
tries that have enveloped Batta, and to see how they have 
extracted 11 vain repetitions ' ' from it, but these dry pre- 
liminarv statements are necessary to understand what 
will f«»ll.»w I will conclude my remarks about the 
identity of Batta-logia and Poly-logia by asking the 
reader to examine the text, which is a compound sen- 
tence, ari l iee, if it is not evident from the logical or 
grammatical connection, of the two members of this 
sentence, that Batta and Poly are synonyms : 



17 



'•When ye pray ME BATTALOGESETE, as the 

heathens 

" For the}^ think that in their much speaking (POLY- 
LOGIA) they may be heard." 

The identity of meaning of Batta and Poly is so clear 
that if Batta were lost, and not found in any manuscript 
of St. Matthew, from the rest of the sentence, it would 
be certain that the missing word must be Poly or a syn- 
onym of Poly. Let us write out the text, omitting Batta. 

' ' When ye pray do not as the heathens. 

" For they think that in their much speaking they may 
be heard." 

The first member tells us not to do something which 
the heathens do. The second tells us why they do it, 
hoping thereby to be heard ; and it also mentions what it 
is, in which they place their hopes of being heard, 
''their much speaking." Hence it is evident that the 
heathen thing prohibited in the first member is much 
speaking, and if the word were lost, its meaning would 
be supplied from the rest of the sentence. Calvin summed 
up all that we are asking by saying : " Christ uses two 
words (Batta and Poly) but they have the same mean- 
ing." 

But the meaning of Poly-logia is much speaking. 

Therefore, the meaning of Batta-logia is much speaking. 

Therefore, our Catholic translation in which both these 
words are rendered much speaking, is correct. 

The next point is to determine the meaning of much 
speaking. What is the much speaking on which the 
heathens rely, on which they place their hopes of being 
heard? Everyone knows what much or many means ; 
they are the opposites of little and few. They express 
a very simple notion of quantity. Much speaking, there- 
fore, is speaking much or many things. It is making a 
long speech. The only idea contained in the phrase 
" much speaking " is that of length; it prescinds alto- 
gether from the quality of the speaking, it merely tells 
us something about its quantity ; much speaking means 
along speech, and its opposite, little speaking, means 
a little or short speech. Of course, our speaking has 



iS 



some quality — it is wise or foolish — it is a connected 
systematic exposition of one subject, or it is disconnected, 
rambling talk, which it is a waste of time to listen to, but 
these and other qualities which may belong to the speech 
or speaking must be expressed by some other words, or 
must be known from some other source than the adjec- 
tive much or many (POLY or BATTA). "Much" 
speaking gives us only one point of information about 
the speaking, its length. It means a long speech, and 
since speaking to God is called prayer, much speaking 
to God means a long prayer. To emphasize its meaning, 
and, in order to give any one who wishes to assail my 
statements a definite point of attack, I shall put it down 
as a proposition. 



19 



CHAPTER III. 



PROPOSITION II. 

The phrase * 1 much speaking " contains in it no notion 
of anything but of length ; it means a long speech ; and 
if it be directed to God, a long prayer. 

It may seem strange that I should insist on the meaning 
of so simple a word as much or many, but sometimes 
simple facts that ought to be clear even to a child are ob- 
scured and hidden under heaps of learned verbiage. 
Much or many, in connection with speaking, is to be 
taken in its obvious sense. In the word POLY-LOGIA, 
therefore, or in its synonym. BATTA-LOGIA, there is no 
other notion than that of length, in speaking. 

Lengthy speeches made to God, or long prayers, are 
mentioned in the Scriptures, it might seem, only to be 
condemned. 

* 1 Wo to you scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites : be- 
cause you devour the houses of widows, praying long 
prayers." — St. Matthew, xxiii-14). 

4 1 Beware of the scribes * "* ' * who devour the 
houses of widows, feigning long prayers." — (St. 
Mark, xii-38). 

"Beware of the scribes * * * who devour the 
houses of widows, feigning long prayers." — (St. 
Luke, xx, 46-47). 

The prayers that Christ heard, and approved of, were 
short : 

The prayer of the leper : " Lord, if thou wilt, 
thou canst make me clean." — (St. Luke, v-12 ; Mark, 
i 40 ; Matthew, vii-2). 

Jairus : "Lord, my daughter is at the point of 
death, but come lay thy hand on her, that she may 



20 



be safe and live. " — (St. Luke, viii-41 ; Mark, v-22 ; 
Matthew, ix-18). 

The two blind men : "Son of David, have mercy 
on us." — (St. Matthew, ix-27). 

The Syrophenician woman : " Have mercy on me, 
O Lord^ Thou Son of David ; my daughter is griev- 
ously troubled by a devil." — (St. Mark, vii-24 ; Mat- 
thew, xv-22). 

The ten lepers; "Jesus, Master, have mercy on 
us." — (St. Luke, xvii-13). 

The publican: "O God, be merciful to me a 
sinner." — (St. Luke, xviii-13). 

The penitent thief : " Lord, remember me when 
thou shalt come into thy kingdom." — (St. Luke, 
xxiii-42). 

The Apostles ; "Lord, save us, we perish." — (St. 
Matthew, viii-25). 

St. Peter (sinking): "Lord, save me." — (St. 
Matthew, xiv-30). 
The prayers which Christ himself said were short : In 
Gethsemane : " O my Father, if it be possible, let this 
chalice pass from me." His prayer for his executioners : 
"Father, forgive them, for they know not what they 
do." And the model prayer, which he taught us, is 
short, 

By contrasting long and short prayers, as I have just 
done, it may look as though a strong case could be made 
out against long prayers. It might seem that the con- 
clusion following from these facts is, that long prayers 
have been condemned by Christ. But no, long praying 
and long prayers are intrinsically good, there is nothing 
wrong in them. Those who have concluded from Christ's 
words that they are forbidden have fallen into that very 
common sophistry of putting more in their conclusion 
than they can find in their premises. Christ tells us to 
avoid one kind of much speaking, or long prayer, that of 
the heathens, or hypocrites ; to say that all long prayers 
are, therefore, condemned is to say something that 
Christ never said, and to arrive at a conclusion that has 
nothing to support it. Nowhere in the Scriptures are 
long prayers condemned, and only in one place (St. 



21 



Matthew, vi-7), are we told not to imitate the long 
prayers of the heathens or hypocrites. Moreover, when 
Christ forbade the long prayers of the heathens or hypo- 
crites, He did not forbid them on account of their length, 
but for another reason. Take notice that Christ empha- 
sises not so much the long prayers, as the men who in- 
dulged in them, or who pretended to do so. 

" Speak not much, as the heathens ... Be not you, 
therefore, like to them" (St. Matthew, vi., 7-8). "The 
people evidently reverenced the Scribes and Pharisees, 
and thought them saintly men on account of their long 
prayers. Christ does not say, " Beware of the Scribes, on 
account of their long prayers." His meaning is rather : 
" Beware of the Scribes, in spite of their long prayers ; " 
and when He says, " Woe to you, Scribes," He does not 
pronounce this woe on account of their prayers, but on 
account of their injustice, which they have made all the 
greater by doing it under the cloak of piety. Besides, 
in His denunciation of the hypocrites He does not say, 
that they prayed long or said long prayers, but that they 
defrauded the widows under the 4 'pretence" of long 
prayers, "feigning" long prayers. (Mark, xii-38 ; Luke, 
xx-46 ; Matthew, in the Greek, xxiii-14). 

We shall put down another peg, showing how far we 
have advanced in the explanation of our text. 



22 



CHAPTER IV. 



PROPOSITION III. 

The much speaking, or long prayers, of the heathens 
are only once condemned in the Scriptures (Matthew, 

vi- 7), and in this place they are condemned, not on ac- 
count of their length, but for another reason ; long 
prayers, therefore, as such, are nowhere condemned in 
the Scriptures. 

Many of Christ's prayers were short, it is true, but 
other prayers of His were long. His prayer for His dis- 
ciples 011 the night before He died takes up a whole 
chapter in St. John, xvii. This prayer is longer than any 
prayer of the hypocrites or heathens given in the Scrip- 
tures ; He spent more time in prayer than any man that 
ever lived upon this earth, and He still, without ceasing 
night or day, is ever making intercession for us (Hebrews, 

vii- 25). 

Nowhere in the Scriptures is there any restriction put 
on repetition, nor is there any limit put to the length of 
our prayers. In these two things we have perfect liberty. 

If we want to get a clear concept of what Christ has 
prohibited (Matthew, vi-7), we must take one point at a 
time for consideration, especially since this text has been 
enveloped in so much Protestant sophistry. 

One thing is clear, viz. : that the heathen prayers that 
are condemned were long ; but in what did the heathen 
much speaking consist? In what did the long heathen 
prayers differ from the long prayers sometimes used by 
the worshippers of the true God? How did they differ 
from the long prayer of Solomon (III. [or I ] Kings viii.- 
iii., 23-25) ? of Esdras (ix., 6-15) ? of Christ (John xvii) ? 

Certainly they differ in their object, or in the persons 
to whom they were addressed ; these prayers were ad- 
dressed to the true God, the pagan prayers to idols, im- 
aginary deities, or to devils. But this is not the point at 
issue ; our Saviour is speaking here only to those w 7 ho 
were worshippers of the true God, and He is speaking of 
the manner of addressing His heavenly Father ; He tells 

?3 



them not to address Him in the same manner as the 
pagans addressed their false gods ; or to be more precise, 
Our Saviour is speaking of the contents of the pagan 
prayer, which made it so long. 

We want to know something of the composition, eon- 
tents, or make-up of the long pagan prayer, and f<ar- 
tunately we do not have to go far to find it, for Our 
Saviour refers in this very place to it (Matthew, vi-8) : 

" Be not you therefore like to them ; 
Vox your heavenly Father knoweth what is needful 
for you, before you ask him." 

It is not necessary for us to 1 ell God our needs, for He 
knows them better than we do ourselves. But the pagans, 
having lost the idea of the true God, did not regard as 
omniscient the deities that they worshipped in His stead. 
They thought that it was necessary to inform them of 
their needs, to show them what was wanted, as a neces- 
sary preliminary to asking their assistance. Hence the 
pagan prayer consisted, first, in a description of their 
needs, and since their gods had limited knowledge, it was 
necessary to explain all their needs in full, and often to 
go into details about themselves, their families and 
friends and the wants of their country if they wished the 
aid of their gods in all these things, hence the pagan 
prayer by its nature was often very long. 

Sometimes the pagan prayers were short. In the con- 
test between the pagan priests and Elias, the priests of 
Baal cried, " O Baal, hear us." Elias used the same peti- 
tion, "O Lord, hear me." Both prayers were but one 
short sentence: "Hear us," "Hear me." The pre- 
arranged agreement between Elias and the pagan priests 
gave sufficient information to the pagan god of what 
was wanted of him, so all that the pagan priests 
needed to do on this occasion was to cry for help. The 
only difference in their prayers was in the persons ad- 
dressed ; in form they were identical. The God of Elias 
could and did hear him. Baal could not and did not. 
There are long Jewish and Christian as well as pagan 
prayers, but as a rule pagan prayers are the longest on 
account of their false notion that instruction and persua- 



24 



sion are necessary in prayer, as well as petition. In our 
prayers petition alone is necessary. Pagan prayers are, 
therefore, of their nature long, and Christian piayers 
only accidentally so, and since things are designated by 
those properties which are distinctive and characteristic 
of them, long prayer, and much speaking, are proper 
names for the heathen addresses to their deities. It 
must be understood that mere length is not wrong, nor is 
it the reason of any condemnation of heathen prayer ; it 
is the want of belief in God's infinite knowledge that 
underlies it, and which makes information therefore 
necessary ; and also the want of belief in God's wonderful 
love of us, and His desire to give us everything that we 
need which is not prejudicial to our salvation, for the 
pagans thought that it was necessary to use arguments 
to convince and persuade their gods just as if they were 
dealing with men. Length in prayer, therefore, is not 
wrong, but the want of faith that makes it necessary, and 
which makes pagan worship an abomination in the eyes 
of God. Pagan prayer, whether short or long, is essen- 
tially wrong, it is the worship of devils (Psalm xcv-5) or 
of some caricature of God ; it is the substitution of some 
creature wmether real or imaginary, in the place of the 
Creator. 

" He orders us, therefore, not to make long prayers. 
Long, not by reason of the time spent in prayer, but 
on account of the multitude of things that are said in 
it. For those who pray ought to persevere in it. 
'Continue steadfast in prayer,' says the Apostle 
(Romans, xii-12). He does not, however, tell us to 
compose a prayer of ten thousand verses and to 
recite it all, which He insinuates when He says : 
' Do not speak much. ' ( Chrysostom ) . 

" A multitude of words was necessary for the Gen- 
tiles, on account of the demons, who did not know 
what was wanted until they w ? ere informed by their 
words ; hence it is added : ' For they think that 
they will be heard on account of their much speak- 
ing.' (Gloss.) Catena Aurea. 1. c. 



25 



The heathens regarded their gods as beings who had 
human passions, who were influenced by motives as we 
are, and who needed to be persuaded to grant favors, as 
do the mortals who inhabit the earth ; hence the art of" 
rhetoric was employed in pagan prayers to persuade their 
gods to grant their requests. The men who composed 
the pagan prayers were often poets whose descrip- 
tions and exhortations to the gods were beautiful 
poetical compositions. The descriptions of their wants 
were expressed in the delightful imagery that the oriental 
mind so much loves, and their fervid appeals to their 
deities were oratorical productions that were often 
models of style. The whole pagan prayer was a finished 
literary composition such as wonld naturally delight and 
move men, and was intended to persuade and render 
propitious the pagan gods. Such pagan prayers were 
naturally attractive and would be prized on account of 
their literary excellence. 

It is a great mistake to imagine that pagan prayer was 
nothing but silly rambling nonsense ; to call it babbling, 
and to translate Our Saviour's words, " Do not babble 
like the heathen," as the Protestant versions prior to the 
authorized have it, shows a delightful ignorance of 
pagan literature and of pagan history. This blissful 
ignorance or forgetfulness, is displayed only by Protest- 
ant commentators, and by some Catholic authors,* who 
have been captivated by the Protestant et} r mological 
guesses at the origin of the word " BATTA." 

The Fathers of the Church never looked on pagan 
prayer as mere babbling. Knowing something of pagan 
literature and culture they considered the pagan prayers 
condemned by Christ as finished literary productions 
and not babbling or vain repetition. 



*Our own Kenrick, influenced by his Protestant reading, was so 
charmed with both the old Protestant mistranslation and the new that 
he shows us his predilection for both of them in his commentary. In 
St. Matthew, vi-7, he gives 41 Do not babble, 11 and even gives us an- 
other mistranslation, *' Do not gabble, 11 which is a little worse than 
that of the Protestant versions. 

In the commentary on Ecclesiasticus, vii-i. c , in a footnote, r he up- 
holds the translation of the King James version, " Vain repetitions, 
without earnestness, are to be avoided." Matt. vi-7. 



26 



"And truly all much speaking comes from the 
Gentiles, who give more attention to the elegant de- 
livery of their prayers than to the cleansing of their 
souls, and by this kind of prayer they endeavor to 
move God." (Augustine). 

1 i True prayer consists rather in the bitter groans 
of repentance than in the resounding periods of an 
oration." (Gregory) Catena Aurea. 1. c. 

That such a notion as " vain repetition " in prayer to 
God should have got into the minds of men and have 
been inserted into St. Matthew, vi-7, is certainly as- 
tonishing, since Christ and his Apostles, by word and ex- 
ample, have urged trie necessity of repetition in prayer, 
and since the living creatures in heaven are incessantly 
repeating God's praises, and since there is ten times as 
much repetition in the prayers and praises of God in the 
Scriptures as there is repetition in all the pagan authors 
extant which were written during the same period. The 
proper epithet for repetition in prayer to God is 4 'useful 
or necessary," not "vain." But so insane was the 
hatred of the Church in the sixteenth and seventeenth 
centuries that the ridiculous mistranslation, " use not 
vain repetitions," was put into Protestant Bibles without 
any opposition, and is retained in them until the present 
day. Why Catholic commentators have given the Pro- 
testant mistranslation so little attention I do not know. 
Perhaps they thought it so stupid as to be hardly worthy 
of attention. A few modern Catholic authors, however, 
can be found who seem to see nothing wrong in the 
Protestant text. 

Napoleon said : ■ " There is only one figure of speech, 
and that is repetition." Truly, it is the most effective of 
all. And we have an example here before us, for Protest- 
ant scholars by constantly repeating their ' ' vain repeti- 
tion " text have come to believe that it is a correct 
translation ot the words used by St. Matthew. They 
never dream of asking themselves if it is. They take 
this for granted. All their efforts are to try to bolster it 
up by etymological shuffling, and by illustrations bor- 
rowed from the Scriptures and from profane authors. 



27 



CHAPTER V. 



THIS PROTESTANT TEXT UNKNOWN TO IyUTHER. 

Luther seems to have known nothing of this Protestant 
" vain repetition " text. Probably it was not in use in 
his day, or at least had not been brought to his attention, 
for in commenting on St. Matthew, vi-y, he recommends 
frequent repetition in prayer ; he condemns long prayers 
(especially the Divine Office) and recommends instead 
short ejaculations of a word or two, or some single 
formula often repeated. These are his words : 

"Wherefore the ancient fathers made no mistake in 
saying that we should not use many long prayers. They 
praised little, short, efficacious, ejaculatory prayers of a 
word or two, sent heavenward (as that of the publican in 
the Scriptures : O God, be merciful tome, a sinner!), 
which any one can quickly and frequently repeat while 
he is engaged in reading, writing or any other business." 

Luther wanted to have a whack at that daily public 
offering of prayer and praise to God which the Church 
enjoins on her priests, deacons, sub-deacons and some 
others, and which we call the Divine Office, the Canon- 
ical Hours, or the Breviary. It takes nearly an hour 
daily to recite it attentively and devoutly, and it takes a 
great deal longer if it is chanted. This prayer is un- 
doubtedly long, and Luther thought that he had a fine 
chance to bang away at it by using the words of Christ, 
" Speak not much" (Matthew, vi-7), as a cudgel. 

Instead of the long string of Psalms, Scripture read- 
ings, Homilies on the Gospels, Hymns, etc., that make 
up the Office, take a short prayer of a word or two, or 
some short formula, he says, and repeat it often. So the 
very text that later Protestants used for condemning 



28 



repetition Luther used as an argument for recommend- 
ing it. 

In the International Illustrated Commentary, edited by 
Schaff, we have the following: "There may be vain 
repetitions of the Lord's Prayer. * * * Hence Luther 
calls it ' the greatest martyr. ' ' ' Whether Luther is cor- 
rectly quoted ,°nd interpreted here or not, I do not know. 
I have not noticed this phrase in his writings. But if he 
should recommend repetition inpraver in one place and 
condemn it in another, that's nothing. He had the 
privilege of changing his mind and of contradicting 
himself. The only point that I wish to bring forward is 
that when Luther was, ex-professo, treating of the text we 
have under discussion, he found in it nothing against 
repetition in prayer, but, on the contrary, he found 
there an argument for it. 



29 



CHAPTER VI. 



CAI/VTN THE INVENTOR OF " VAIN REPETITION?" 

As far as my reading goes, I think that the credit of 
having invented, or at least of having suggested 4 'vain 
repetitions," belongs to Calvin. In his comment on our 
text, he says: Battalogia, " supervacua est et putida 
repetitio." — Battalogia is 1 1 vain and stinking repeti- 
tion, " This was so delicious a morsel that it was seized 
upon and inserted into the Authorized Protestant version 
of i6ii, and although the Revised Protestant version has 
many changes in the Sermon on the Mount, this phrase 
was allowed to go untouched, although some slight 
changes were made in the very text in which it occurs.* 

The translators of the King James Bible took only 
" vain repetitions " from Calvin. They omitted the word 
"stinking." Why, I do not know. Perhaps they 
thought that it did not sound nice. However that may 
be, this word " stinking " which they left out is much 
better than the words which they retained, for it is 
merely vulgar, stupid and irrelevant ; it has nothing at 
all to do w 7 ith the text ; whereas, ' k vain repetition," far 
from being merely irrelevant, is opposed to the true 
meaning of the text, for this very text, the only one 
which Protestants use for attacking repetition, is the 
very one in which Christ indirectly recommends it. 
Even Luther was able to see this. 

I think that it would be more correct to say that Calvin 
suggested vain repetitions, rather than invented, for I do 
not think that he imagined that there was any condem- 

*According to the English Hexapla, "Use not vain repetitions 1 ' 
made its first appearance in English in the King James, or Authorized 
Protestant version of 1611, but in the edition of Tyndale's New Testa- 
ment, printed at Andover, from Bagster's London Ed. of 1837, "Use 
no vayne repetitions " is attributed to the Genevan version of 1557. 



30 



nation of repetition in Christ's words. He simply 
wanted to give vent to his auti- Catholic hatred. 

The special object of his attack is the Divine Office, 
■just asjt was the object of Luther's attack in his com- 
ment on the same text ; but since there is very little re- 
petition in the Divine Office, no more, probably, than 
might be found in some Protestant prayer books'* there 
is no reason why he should have attacked repetition 
here ; he simply wanted to brand our prayers as ' ' vain 
and stinking," and to get some sort of a Scriptural back- 
ing for his assertion. The word repetition happened to 
come into his mind as something on which he might 
paste these epithets, but there are many other nouns, I 
have no doubt, which would have served his purpose 
just as well. I shall give Calvin's comments and the 
reader can see for himself that "repetition" has not 
been thought out or evolved from the text ; it just slipped 
in by accident ; he could not think of any other better 
noun at the time, so he let it go. " Vain and stinking " 
was what he w 7 anted to say, and he said it. Whether 
these beautiful epithets hit the length of our prayers, or 
any repetitions that may be found in them, or something 
else, did not make any difference to Calvin, as long as 
he managed to find an excuse for flinging them at us. It 
does not make any difference to me, as far as my argu- 
ment goes, whether the word "repetition" was used by 
Calvin intentionally or accidentally, or whether the 
translators of the Authorized Protestant version borrowed 
it from him or from some one else. It is equally false as a 
translation or interpretation of the text in any case : but 
I shall give Calvin's words, together with their context, 
and my opinion that his use of the word is only acci- 
dental, and then let the reader form his own opinion on 
the subject, and keep it. 

*In the Episcopalian Book of Common Prayer, the Evening Prayer 
for the 28th day of the month begins with Psalm 135 [136], which con- 
sists of 27 verses, and in each verse is repeated the refrain : " For 
His mercy endureth forever." 



31 



CHAPTER VII. 



WAS CALVIN'S invention of vain repetitions 

MERELY ACCIDENTAL? 

I think that it was, and so I shall give here all that 
Calvin has to say on the text, and then the reader can 
see for himself if my opinion is well founded. If the 
reader thinks that Calvin carefully thought out the 
phrase, "Battalogia is vain and stinking repetition," 
then the entire credit of its invention belongs to him 
(unless some prior claimant can be found for that 
honor). He says : 

" 'SPEAK NOT MUCH.' Christ reproves another fault 
in prayer, namely, much speaking. He uses two words, 
but they have the same sense, for Battalogia is vain and 
stinking repetition, and Polylogia is empty loquacity (in- 
anis garrulitas) . Moreover, Christ reproves the silliness 
of those who, in order that they may persuade and move 
God, pour out many words. The continuance in prayer 
praised here and there in the Scriptures is not at variance 
with this teaching. For when prayer springs from 
earnest desire the tongue does not supplant the heart, 
and then God's grace is not sought after by means of an 
empty outpouring of words, but on the contrary, the 
loving heart sends forth its sighs like arrows which pene- 
trate the heavens. 

' ' Meanwhile the superstition of those is condemned who 
put their trust in their long whispered mutterings in or- 
der to gain merit before God. We see the Papacy so im- 
bued with this error that it thinks that the chief element 
of prayer is loquacity, for the more words one murmurs 
out the more exactly he is thought to have prayed. 
Long and prolix chants, as if to soothe the ears of God, 
are forever resounding in their temples. 



32 



" 1 YOUR FATHER KNOWETH.' This one remedy is 
sufficient to purge and take away the superstition that is 
here condemned, for whence comes this foolishness that 
makes men think that they are making great progress 
when they weary God with their much speaking, unless 
they imagine that He is like a mortal man who needs to 
be taught and reminded ? But every one who is per- 
suaded that God not only cares for us but that he even 
knows all our wants, and that he foresees our desires and 
troubles, before He is admonished, he omitting all much 
speaking, will be content to continue his prayers just 
long enough to exercise his faith, and he will perceive 
that to approach Godlike a rhetorician, in order to move 
Him by a wealth of words, is absurd and ridiculous. ' ' 

Some of these statements are good and true, but they 
are spoiled by abuse. To get a clearer notion of what 
Calvin says, let us take a sentence at a time and ex- 
amine it. 

CALVIN : "Speak not much. Christ reproves an- 
other fault in prayer, namely, much speaking." 

That is correct. Calvin does not give the Vulgate 
translation (Nolite multum loqui), he gives that of 
Erasmus (Ne sitis multiloqui) instead; their grammati- 
cal structure is a little different, but the Greek, the 
Vulgate, and that of Erasmus, which Calvin follows, are 
identical in sense. All through his comment, excepting 
one phrase, there is no mention of repetition, but a dozen 
times he speaks of much speaking, or silly, lengthy 
speaking, in prayer. Here are all the w T ords he uses : 
Multiloqui, multiloquium (three times), inanis garruli- 
tas, multum verborum profudunt, inani verborum fluxu, 
longis sussurris, loquacitas, plus verborum demurmurat, 
longi prolixique cantus, verborum copia. If Calvin 
thought that Battalogia meant vain repetition, it is sur- 
prising that he did not make use of this notion some- 
where in his comment on the text ; but since he did not, 
it is most probable that he merely used the word repeti- 
tion as a peg on which to hang his epithets ' ' vain and 
stinking." 



33 



CALVIN: [Christ] "uses two words, but they have 
the same sense." 

Correct. 

CALVIN : " For Battalogia is vain and stinking repe- 
tition, and Polylogia, empty loquacitas." 

No. Battalogia and Polylogia have not these mean- 
ings ; if they had, then they would not have the same 
sense ; for repetition and lengthy speaking are not by 
any means the same thing. Psalm 135 [136] is full of 
repetition, but not of loquacity ; a lawyer in summing up 
an important case may make a very long speech, lasting 
hours, and yet not go over any of his ground twice, not 
repeat at all. Length and repetition, both in speaking 
and in everything else, are two altogether different 
things ; it is wonderful what a muddle every Protestant 
commentator gets into in explaining this text ( Matt. 
vi-7). If a man in speaking of some profane subject 
were to make so many illogical breaks he would be con- 
sidered wanting in ordinary intelligence. Notice that in 
his first translation, which is that of Erasmus, Batta- 
logein is rendered "Speak (not) much." But here two 
lines later on he says Battalogia is vain and stinking 
repetition. 

Battalogia and Polylogia simply express length in 
speaking, and nothing else ; they are not qualified by any 
such adjectives as vain, stinking, foolish, silly, empty, 
superstitious, etc. These words, no doubt, relieve the 
feelings of the Protestant scholars who indulge in them, 
but they cannot find anything to justify them in our 
text, or anywhere else in the Scriptures. 

CALVIN : 4 ' Christ reproves the silliness of those who, 
in order that they may persuade and move God, pour out 
many words," 

Very good. Pouring out many words is much speak- 
ing. But many words used to persuade and move, are 
not 11 vain repetitions," nor are they ' 4 empty loquacity 
or garrulity." Such things persuade neither God nor 
men. 



34 



CALVIN: (last line) "To approach God like a rhe- 
torcian, in order to move Him by a wealth of words, is 
absurd and ridiculous." 

Very true : But a rhetorcian does not employ "vain 
repetition," or, "inane or empty loquacity." He em- 
ploys the most convincing arguments that he can think 
of, clothed in the most elegant diction. 

CALVIN: "Meanwhile, the superstition of those is 
condemned who put their trust in long whispered- 
mutterings ' ' ( sussurris) . 

This is a thrust at us priests, who daily recite the 
Divine Office. It is recited or chanted in public, aloud ; 
but when we recite it privately, there is no reason why 
we should disturb the neighborhood by shouting out our 
prayers. God will hear them just as well when we retire 
into our rooms and recite them in whispers, or even in- 
audibly and even if we are naturally devoid of grace, 
and if the recitation of our prayers is so inartistic as to 
deserve to be called ' ' sussurrant ' ' muttering, it does not 
matter ; God looks deeper than that. When Anna in the 
grief of her heart indistinctly or inaudibly muttered her 
prayers before the tabernacle, Heli thought that she was 
drunk, and told her so : 

" As Anna had her heart full of grief, she prayed to the 

Lord, shedding many tears, and saying ; if thou wilt 

give to they servant a man-child, I will give him to the 

Lord all the days of his life as she multiplied prayers 

before the Lord Heli observed her mouth. Now 

Anna spoke in her heart, and only her lips moved, but 
her voice was not heard at all. Heli therefore thought 
her to be drunk, and said to her : How long wilt thou 
be drunk ? Digest a little the wine, of which thou hast 
taken too much." (I. Kings [I. Sam.] i. 10-14). 

Notwithstanding the inartistic manner of Anna's prayer 
and the bad impression that she made on Heli by her 
mumbling to herself, it was pleasing to God, and He 
heard it, and gave her a son, Samuel the prophet. Calvin 
and the rest of the reformers and as many of our Protest- 
ant brethern as wish to do so, may treat our prayers with 



35 



as much aversion and contempt, as did Heli the prayer of 
Anna, it matters little to us, so long as they are accept- 
able to God. 

CALVIN : " We see the Papacy so imbued with this 
error that it thinks, that the chief element of prayer is 
loquacity, for the more words one murmurs out, the more 
exactly he is thought to have prayed." 

Calvin well knew that this statement of his was a 
simple falsehood. I call attention to it, because in it he 
mentions the bull's eye, at which his shafts are aimed, 
the Papacy. The daily offering of prayer that the 
Papacy imposes on its ministers consists of a number of 
the Psalms, Scripture readings, Homilies on the Gospels, 
a very short life of some saint, hymns, and some peti- 
tions ; it is certainly long, loquacious, Calvin prefers to 
call it, since that is a repulsive name ; but its characteris- 
tic is not repetition. If Calvin had thought that repeti- 
tion was condemned in this text (Matt, vi-7), he would 
have attacked the Rosary, the Litanies, or some other 
prayers in which there is a good deal of repetition, but 
he does not ; and in attacking the Papacy in this place, 
he would have said, the Papacy thinks that the chief 
element of prayer is repetition. He does not ; he says ; 
"the Papacy thinks that the chief element of prayer is 
loquacity." And instead of saying ' 4 the more words one 
murmurs out" the more exactly he is thought to have 
prayed ; he would have said : "The oftener he repeats 
the same words, ' ' etc. From a careful study of his words, 
it appears that it was length in prayer, flavored with 
some adjectives of his own, that he was attacking, and 
not repetition ; the word repetition therefore in his defi- 
nition of Battologia seems to have slipped in accidentally, 
as a word to fill up a sentence often presents itself to 
the mind of a writer, which he accepts and puts down, to 
save himself the trouble of hunting for a more accurate 
word, 

CALVIN: "Long and prolix chants, as if to soothe 
the ears of God, are forever resounding in their temples " 

(Notice "long and prolix " — not " repeated " chants). 



36 



Very true. Religious communities of men and women 
in the Catholic Church, scattered here and there through- 
out the earth, are forever raising their hearts and voices 
to God in prayer and praise ; beginning here on earth, 
what they hope to continue to do in heaven, throughout 
all the ages of eternity, 

" And we will sing our Psalms 
All the days of our life 
In the house of the Lord." 

— (Isaias, xxxviii-20). 

despite all the abuse of Calvin, Luther and the rest of the 
reformers. 

From a careful reading of Calvin's somewhat disjointed 
comment, then, it seems to be a rush of anger and abuse, 
rather than a carefully thought out exposition and appli- 
cation of the text. After his incorrect definitions of Bat- 
talogia and Polylogia, his comment proper begins, and in 
it we have nothing about repetition, but merely an at- 
tack on lengthy prayers ; prayers intended to persuade 
and move God by their length or rhetoric ; the chanting 
or recital of the Divine Office, and the Papacy for enjoin- 
ing it ; hence "vain repetition " was not the product of 
careful study, but an accidental find, at first, used most 
probably, as a handy hook on which to hang some silly 
anti-Catholic abuse ( "vain and stinking"). 

Possibly Calvin got the notion of repetition from Beza, 
who translated this text " Ne eadem blaterato." Do 
not babble the same words. 



37 



CHAPTER VIII 



the; meaning ok the text. 

"When you are praying, speak not much as the 
heathen." — Matthew, vi-7. 

We have given our attention so far to the Protestant 
mistranslation, "Use not vain repetitions;" now, how- 
ever, we shall take the correct translation given above, 
and develop its meaning. 

I,ONG PRAYERS. 

The only notion contained in u much speaking," as 
we have seen some time ago, is that of length ; much 
speaking is a long speech, and in the present instance, 
since the much speaking is that used in praying, what is 
condemned here is long prayers. 

DESCRIPTIVE PRAYERS. 

We also know something of the contents of the long 
prayers that Christ condemns. Do not pray in this way, 
He says: "For your Father knoweth what is needful 
for you, before you ask Him." The long prayers con- 
demned, gave God (or the gods that the heathens ad- 
dressed) information about their needs; they contained 
a description or account of everything that they wanted, 
or which they thought good for them. It is a very 
grievous insult to God, it is equivalent to a denial of His 
existence, to think that anything is unknown to Him, 
and that it is necessary to inform Him of anything. 
When we pray, we go to God as beggars, not as teachers. 
Instead of teaching Him what we need, we ask Him to 



38 



teach us what we need, so that we may know what to ask 
of Him. 4 4 Lord, teach us to pray, " (Luke xi-i ). When 
God wants to give us anything He first puts the thought 
and the desire of it into our minds and hearts, and urges 
us by His grace to ask Him for it, and if we listen to His 
inspirations, and ask for what He prompted us to beg of 
Him, He will grant it. 

But it was necessary for the heathens to teach their 
gods (the devils) what they wanted, otherwise they 
would not know what was required of them. 

The polished pagan put his petitions to his deities in 
the most elegant and persuasive language. The prayers 
of the cultured pagan were not "babbling'' or 4 'silly 
repetition." Protestants have not been able to find a 
single example in Homer, Virgil or any of the pagan 
poets, to support such an opinion. 

The next question that naturally suggests itself is, 
4 4 Why did Christ say: 44 Speak not much, as the 
heathen " ? Why did he not say : Speak not much, as 
the hypocritical Pharisees, for it was not the heathen 
that He was then condemning, but the Pharisees, for 
their heathenish practice. If it were only the heathen, 
and not any of the Jews, that were guilty of the heathen- 
ish manner of prayer that our Saviour is condemning, 
there would have been no occasion for Him to refer to it 
here. 

4 4 The error was also common among the Jews, else 
Christ would not have rebuked it." (St. Matt, with 
S. S. notes, Internat. series, R. Franklin Johnson, 
D. D.) 

To brand anything as heathenish was to make it de- 
testable to a Jew. The heathen and the Pharisee had the 
same style of long prayer, but their prayers did not pro- 
ceed from the same motive. The earnest pagan prayed 
at length to let his gods know his needs, because he 
thought, that they could not know his wants unless he 
stated them. 

Such lengthy prayers were sensible and necessary in 
the heathens, that the devils might know their wants and 



39 



help them. But no Jew ever said or thought that it was 
necessary to teach God his needs, for he knew that God 
is omniscient. The long pagan prayer was based on the 
denial of one of God's attributes, His infinite knowl- 
edge ; in its origin it was blasphemous. Our Saviour 
does not say or hint that the prayers of the Pharisees 
were blasphemous, but He shows the beautiful long 
prayers of the Pharisees to be identical in their style 
with the blasphemous prayers of the heathen, and thus 
annuls whatever attractiveness these prayers would natur- 
ally have in the eyes of the people ; the Pharisees prayed 
simply and solely to be seen, heard and admired by men. 

LENGTHY, DESCRIPTIVE PRAYERS, NOT- INTRINSICALLY 
WRONG. 

If we did not mention the things that we needed, 
either specially or in a general way, we could not pray at 
all ; we have some examples of detailed description in 
the inspired petitions in the Holy Scriptures. If we find 
relief for our souls in pouring out to God all our needs in 
minutest detail, if it be any help to devotion, by all means 
let us do so. The pagan prayers were lengthy and de- 
scriptive ; very well, but this is not the reason for their 
condemnation. We must go farther. Christ is not con- 
demning length ; His own prayers were sometimes long. 
He is not condemning description or detail, some of it 
could be found in His prayers. He is not condemning 
repetition. His own prayers were often repeated. He is 
not here condemning superstition. What He is con- 
demning here, as in so many other places, is hypocrisy. 
L,et us see. 

HYPOCRITICAL PRAYERS. 

Let us take the first half of the sixth chapter of St. 
Matthew, (verses 1-18), and read carefully all that Christ 
says about alms-deeds, prayer and fasting. Our Saviour 
is insisting on only one point — that we should do our 
good works for God and not that they may be seen and 



40 



admired by men. This part of His sermon opens with 
the words : 

"Take heed that you do not your justice before 
men to be seen by them ; otherwise you shall not 
have a reward of your Father who is in heaven." 
(Matt. vi-i). 

Then He singles out alms-deeds, prayer and fasting, 
and accuses the Pharisees of doing these not to please 
God, but to be seen by men : 

ALMS : ' 1 Sound not a trumpet before thee, as the 
hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, that 
they may be honored by men." 

PRAYER: "The hypocrites, that love to stand and 
pray in the synagogues and corners of the streets, that 
they may be seen by men." 

FASTING : ' 1 For they disfigure their faces that they 
may appear unto men to fast." 

The only object that the Pharisees had in doing good 
was to be seen and admired and praised by men. * 4 And 
all their works they do, to be seen by men." (Matt. 
xxiii-5). 

In praying, they could be both seen and heard. The 
reverent posture and gestures could be seen, the words 
could be heard, and the composition and pious declama- 
tion would naturally awaken more admiration than the 
mere posture or gesticulation accompanying its delivery, 

"Take heed that you do not your justice before men, 
to be seen by them," is the dominant note in this part of 
our Saviour's mountain sermon (vi., 1-18). Alms, prayer 
and fasting are the three divisions of the subject, and He 
shows how the Pharisees had perverted each of these 
good works, doing them not to please God, but for their 
own glory. I have read commentary after commentary 
by learned Protestant scholars to see if they perceived 
any unity of thought and treatment in our Saviour's dis- 
course on alms-deeds, prayer and fasting, and to see 
if they consistently expounded it from this point of view 
throughout, but I did not find a single one. Of course if 



4i 



the discourse is treated in this logical manner, it is im- 
possible to get "use not vain repetitions " into the text. 
Our Saviour puts His general proposition first. Take 
heed that you do not your justice* before men. (Matt, 
vi-i). He then follows with the three divisions of the 
subject, alms-deeds, prayer and fasting, and under each 
heading he condemns the Pharisees for the motive which 
they had in performing these good w T orks, and He ex- 
horts His hearers not to give alms, not to pray, not to 
fastf as they did. 

If any one will read the first eighteen verses of the 
sixth chapter of St. Matthew, I do not think that he can 
find anything else there, but this one thought and its 
amplification. Do not your good works before men to be 
seen by them, but do them for God. If Christ's sermons 
were treated like those of a mere scholar, no one would 
think of tearing a word or sentence out of its context, 
and of building theories and denunciations of his neigh- 
bors on it. The one dominant thought running through 
all this sermon on alms, prayer and fasting, may, per- 
haps, even be traced in the petitions of the prayer which 
Christ taught us as a substitute for the long oratorical 
productions of the Pharisees : 

" Hallowed be Thy Name ; Thy kingdom come ; Thy 
will be done." The motive of the Pharisees' prayer as 
well as of everything else that he did was, hallowed or 
glorified be my name. 

Of the three means of glorifying themselves and of 
gratifying their vanity, it seems to me that prayer was 
the favorite one with the Pharisees, for besides the honor 
to be had from the making of the public prayer itself, it 
afforded them an opportunity of making the bystanders 
acquainted with their generosity and their mortifications. 
" I fast twice in the week ; I give tithes of all that I pos- 
sess." (Luke, xviii). 



*In the authorized Prot. version this text is incorrectly rendered : 
"Take heed that ye do not your alms before men," but it has been cor- 
rected in the revised version. 

fit is worthy of note that Christ does not say that the Pharisees 
fasted; he says : " They disfigure their faces, that they may appear 
unto men to fast.' 1 



•12 



Christ dwells longer on the abuse of prayer than He 
does on that of alms-deeds or fasting, and condemns the 
Pharisees chiefly for it ; and He has given us a special 
parable about the Pharisee who went up into the temple 
to pray (Luke, xviii), but no parable about the Pharisee 
who fasted or gave alms. 

If the Pharisee gave alms solely to be honored by men, 
if he fasted only to be seen by men, if he prayed in public 
places simply for the purpose of being seen and admired 
by men, with what motive did he compose the prayers 
that he recited in public? Evidently the composition 
and delivery of the prayer was undertaken with the very 
same motive that prompted him to recite it in a conspicu- 
ous place. This was his motive and his only motive. 

They prayed not from any supernatural motive, but 
simply to be admired. Their prayers as well as their 
other acts were all done to gain public esteem. Our 
Saviour's words on this point ought to be sufficient : 
"And all their works they do for to be seen by men," 
(Matt, xxiii). St. Chrysostom's comment on these words 
is worthy of mention : " Non enim simpliciter ait 
(Christus) quod faciunt opera sua ut videantur ab homi- 
nibus, sed addidit omnia." (Cat. Aurea. Matt, xxiii). 

EXTEMPORE PRAYERS. 

Since the long prayers of the Pharisees were made to 
awaken the admiration of those who heard them, what 
sort of prayers must they have been ? Certainly those 
best calculated to attain this end. They must have been 
beautiful compositions, such as would delight the poetic 
Oriental mind, and must have been delivered with all 
possible solemnity. They must have been in rhetoric 
and elocution oratorical models. Silly, rambling talk 
would have exposed them to ridicule, or would have ren- 
dered their prayers unworthy of notice, and would have 
defeated the very end for which they were made. A 
recital of the prayers prescribed for use in the synagogues 
would — and probably often did — afford these men con- 
sumed with vanity an opportunity for some ostentation ; 
but the so-called extempore prayer is the one which 



43 



affords the fullest opportunity for the exhibition of all 
one's natural talents and graces. It is to be remem- 
bered that Christ never condemned the prayers pre- 
scribed for use in the synagogue. He, on the con- 
trary, approved of them by participating in them all the 
time of His life here on earth, and nowhere in the Scrip- 
tures is there any condemnation of them. Hypocrites of 
all ages have a craze for extempore public prayer. Such 
prayers are made not to please God, but to exhibit them- 
selves. The only example of a Pharisee's prayer which 
Our Saviour has given to us, and which He condemns, is 
an extempore prayer (Luke xviii), and this prayer is not 
an isolated instance, but a specimen. There is nothing 
in the Scriptures nor in any ancient document to make 
us think that the Pharisees had any liking for repetition 
in prayer. Repetition in prayer is the Scriptural, 
Christ-given, most simple, most natural, method of 
prayer, and one which affords little or no opportunity for 
display, and hence was not likely to find favor with 
those who courted public admiration. The Pharisee's 
ideal prayer, the one which allowed him the fullest 
means for personal display, was the extempore prayer. 



44 



CHAPTER IX. 



PUBUC EXTEMPORE PRAYERS CONDEMNED. 

Summary Explanation of the Text : ' ' Speak Not 
Much as the Heathen.' (Matthew, vi-7). 

So far, we have seen, first, that the prayers condemned 
by Christ were lengthy, that is the only notion contained 
in the phrase ' ' speak much. ' ' 

In the next place we find that it is implied in the 
words, 1 ' Your father knoweth, " etc., that these prayers 
were full of descriptions or accounts of the petitioners 
needs. For the pagans this was necessary ; but for the 
Jews, whom Christ addressed, it was not, so their use of 
this pagan style of prayer was for some other purpose. 

From what we know of the cultured Greek and Roman 
pagans, we conclude that their prayers were not silly 
Dabbling, or silly repetitions, but beautiful oratorical 
compositions. 

Next, taking a wider view of Christ's words, taking in 
the whole of the immediate context, all that He says of 
alms, prayer and fasting (Matt, vi., 1-8), we find that the 
only thing that He is condemning is the motive that the 
Pharisees had in doing these good works (Matt, vi-i), 
which was the motive of all their works (Matt, xxiii-5) : 
" For all their works they do to be seen by men'* 

The conclusion, therefore follows, that since they 
prayed to awaken public admiration, they used what 
would be best suited for that purpose, and the prayer 
that affords the fullest opportunity for personal display, 
oratorical effort and self-laudation is the public (so-called, 
although often miscalled) extempore prayer. 

"Speaking," or " speeches," is a good name for Phari- 
saical prayers, for, though nominally delivered at God, 



45 



they are really speeches for the audience. Such prayer- 
speeches are not confined to the clever Pharisees or to 
the cultured heathen, nor did they cease with Apostolic 
times. They are sufficiently common in our own day 
and in our own land. Not to mention prayer meet- 
ings, at the opening of our legislatures and on other 
public occasions, our Protestant ministers do not neglect 
so excellent an opportunity of displaying their literary 
accomplishments in telling God what the country needs, 
and once in a while even a Catholic priest on like occa- 
sions gives a similar exhibition. Who is there who has 
witnessed one of these beautiful prayer speeches who 
imagined that the orator was as anxious to have God 
hear him as he was to have his audience delighted with 
his effort ? 

The prayers, then, which Christ condemned, are those 
favorite prayers of Protestants and Pharisees and hea- 
thens — the public so-called, although often well prepared 
and studied, extempore prayers. In commenting on 
their vain repetition text, Protestant scholars eulogize 
extempore prayer and condemn repetition. They have 
the matter badly mixed up, for they are recommending 
what Christ implicitly condemns, and are condemning 
what He implicitly recommends. 

Is there anything wrong in beautiful prayer, in prayer 
expressed in beautiful language? No, certainly not; 
whatever is best and most beautiful should be used" in the 
service of God. Many of the prayers in the Scriptures, 
and many of the prayers of the church, are most beautiful. 
Is there anything wrong, intrinsically, in extempore 
prayer? No; everyone uses it to some extent, but the 
inspired words that have come from God through the 
sacred writers and the prayers of the Church, the Spouse 
of Christ, are better, and we naturally prefer to address 
God in these words which we know are most pleasing to 
Him, but we are free to use words of our own if we wish, 
whenever we will. Is there anything wrong in long 
prayer ? No ; although if one is in earnest the long 
prayer will be the exception, not the rule. Was there 
anything intrinsically wrong in praying in the synagogue 
and at the street corners (Matt, vi-5)? No, certainly 



46 



not ; prayer can and should be made in every place (I. 
Tim., 2-8). The long prayer and the prayer made at the 
street corners were wrong on account of the motive that 
prompted the Pharisees in making them, their insane 
thirst to be seen and admired by men ; but a man, if he 
be in earnest, will naturally and usually employ short 
formulas of prayer, and repeat them often. All these 
things which the Pharisees did were good in themselves, 
otherwise the people would not have admired them, but 
the motive which they had in doing them was the leaven 
which corrupted them all (L,uke, xii-i). 



t 



47 



CHAPTER X. 



REPETITION IN PRAYER RECOMMENDED. 

Now concerning repetition, which Protestants have 
foolishly tried to extract from Battalogein : 

In the first place, we have seen that no such notion is 
contained in this word. 

In the next place, the following text, 4 'Your father 
knoweth what is needful for you before you ask Him," 
cannot be reconciled with a condemnation of repetition. 
For repetition, whether wise or foolish, does not give any 
knowledge of our needs. All the knowledge that is con- 
veyed, if there be any, is conveyed in the first petition, 
e. g. "Lord, save me," — the hundreth time that it may 
be repeated adds not a particle of additional information 
to that contained in its first utterance. Repetition does 
not give additional knowledge, but additional force, the 
eagerness and earnestness of the petitioner may grow at 
each repetition ; the willingness of the one petitioned to 
grant what is asked, may become greater at each renewed 
request, but there is no more knowledge on either side 
by reason of the repetitions than if there had been but 
the first petition. 

Again, if we study our text with its whole context 
(Matt, vi., 1-18), we are still further convinced that the 
Protestant vain repetition text is irreconcilable with the 
context, for there is nothing in long continued repetition 
to attract attention and admiration (Matt, vi-i ; xxiii-5). 
Hence the repetition of the formulas of prayer, which 
formed a part of the service of the synagogue, was not 
what Christ here condemns. We have a sample of re- 
peated prayer, and of its effect on the multitude, given 
by the synoptists. The blind man of Jericho, when he 
heard that Jesus was passing by, began to cry out u Son 

48 



of David, have mercy on rne ; Son of David, have mercy 
on me." The three Evangelists tell what 'effect his re- 
peated prayer had on the people ; many of them re- 
buked him, and told him to keep quiet (Matt, xx-31 ; 
Mark x-48 ; Luke xviii 39), but Jesus listened to him and 
gave him his sight. 

The only sample that we have of a Pharisee's prayer 
(of thanksgiving) is one that, contains no repetition, and 
the only one of Christ's nightly prayers, when He retired 
to pray, that is recorded, is all repetition : 

THE PHARISEE, standing, prayed thus with him- 
self : " O God, I give Thee thanks that I am not as the 
rest of men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, as also is 
this publican. I fast twice in the week ; I give tithes of 
all that I possess." (Luke, xviii-2). 

CHRIST: "He fell upon his face, praying and say- 
ing : O My Father, if it be possible, let this chalice pass 
from me. . . Again He went the second time and 
prayed And He prayed the third time, say- 
ing the same words." (Matt, xxvi., 39, 42, 44). 

Are not the parables of the unjust judge and the mid- 
night visitor, exhortations to repetition ? The first 
prayer of the widow to the ' unjust judge was not 
answered, but because she continued its repetition, at 
last it was heard, (Luke, xviii., 3-10). 

The friend who called at such an unseasonable hour at 
first was refused, but by repeating his knocking and re- 
peating his prayer, at last it was granted. (Luke, xi). 

If Christ condemned repetition, He would have con- 
demned the Scriptures in which it abounds. He would 
have condemned the heavenly spirits who are endlessly 
repeating His praises. (Apoc. iv-8 ; Isaias vi-3). 

He would have condemned Himself, and especially 
that prayer that He said in Gethsemane, the night before 
He died. There is no foundation in the text (Matt. 
yi-7), or in its context, or anywhere in the Scriptures, or 
in reason, for the silly Protestant mistranslation, " Use 
not vain repetitions." 

In our text itself (Matt, vi-7), we have an implied ex- 
hortation to repetition. 



49 



If our petitions be short (e. g., like those of the Lord's 
prayer), and if we are urged, to spend a long time in 
prayer, how can we reconcile the two? If our petition 
be short, and we spend a long time in begging God to 
give us what we want, we cannot do so unless by repeal- 
ing the same petition many times in the very same, or in 
equivalent, words. Our Saviour's disapproval of long 
prayer, therefore, taken with His exhortation to continue 
long in prayer, is an implicit recommendation of repeti- 
tion in prayer. Perseverance and repetition in prayer 
are almost synonymous. Has any Protestant attempted 
to show how any one can continue long in earnest prayer 
without much repetition? Christ spent whole nights 
alone in prayer. What words he used, when He used 
them, we do not know, except in one instance, on^that 
memorable night in Gethsemane. Then His prayer was 
short, very short, and often repeated. 

The Protestant paraphrase, " Use not vain repetitions,' ' 
therefore, is not merely a misinterpretation, or slight dis- 
tortion of the meaning of the text, but rather a reversal 
of its meaning, an interpretation put into the mouth ot 
Christ, which makes Him condemn what He really 
(taken with His exhortation to perseverance) in this 
very text implicitly recommends. 



50 



CHAPTER XI. 



THE STOCK ILLUSTRATIONS : BAAL AND DIANA. 

We have one example in the Scriptures of a heathen 
petition, the prayer of the priests of Baal (III. [I.] Kings, 
xviii., 26-37) I we have also one example in the Scriptures 
of heathen praise, the shouts in honor of Diana. 

But we have no example in the Scriptures of heathens 
using the kind of heathen petition that Christ refers to in 
Matt, vi-7, when He says, "Speak not much, as the 
heathen," for the heathen prayers that He alludes to 
there were those that consisted in a detailed description 
of their wants, as we have already shown. The prayer of 
the priests of Baal was not a description of their needs, 
but a petition as simple as any petition should be. As 
far as its length, its form and its repetition are concerned 
no fault can be found with it whatever. The examples 
of Baal and Diana are altogether irrelevant if Batta is 
correctly translated and understood ; but as they are 
dragged into nearly every Protestant commentary as 
illustrations of the Protestant misinterpretation, "Use 
not vain repetitions," I shall notice them here. 

Our Saviour (Matt, vi., 7-8), is speaking only of peti- 
tion, of prayer in the strict sense of the word, of asking 
God for w T hat we want. ' ' Your Heavenly Father knoweth 
what is needful for you before you ask Him." The 
worshippers of Diana were not asking here for anything 
(Acts, xix) ; they were not praying to her; they were 
shouting her praises. Our Saviour is not speaking here 
(Matt, vi-7) of praise, but of petition or prayer. 

It was foolish for the priests of Baal to ask Baal for 
anything, for he could not help them. No such person 
as Baal existed outside cf their imaginations It was 
foolish to praise Diana, for the same reason. Moreover, 



5i 



it was a great crime, for Baal and Diana were substituted 
by the heathens in place of Him, Who is the Creator and 
Lord of all things, and they were petitioned and praised 
as the Creator only should have been petitioned and 
praised. 

The sin in the prayer of the priests of Baal consisted 
in addressing the sun-gcd, as it is only lawful to address 
the God Who made the sun and all things. The priests 
of Baal cried out, "O Baal, hear us," with the same 
hope and belief that Elias had when he cried, "Hear 
me, O Lord, hear me!" They attributed to Baal the 
power which Elias attributed to God. As " Baal " means 
" Lord," the cry of the priests of Baal might be truth- 
fully rendered, 44 O Lord, hear us; O Lord, hear us!" 
Their cry was the same as that of Elias, "Hear me, O 
Lord, hear me!" Their crime was in addressing to a 
creature words which should only be addressed to the 
Creator, and in using them with the same meaning as we 
do when we address them to God. 

It is astonishing to find Protestants so totally muddled 
in commenting on this text, as to think that the repeti- 
tions of the words addressed to Baal constituted the'ir 
offense. 

Do these gentlemen think that. if priests of Baal cried 
out only once, "O Baal, hear us," that their prayer 
would have been good and proper? There was repetition 
in their prayer, and repetition in the prayer of Elias, and 
both prayers were alike in words and sense. The ieason 
why the priests of Baal saying "Hear us, O Lord, hear 
us," did wrong, and why Elias saying "Hear me, O 
Lord, hear me," did right, was that Elias addressed the 
Creator of the Universe, Who could and did hear him, 
and that the priests of Baal addressed something that 
had neither life, nor sense, nor power to hear or help 
them. 

The crowd at Ephesus, when they heard that their 
goddess was attacked, cried out : ' ' Great is Diana of the 
Ephesians !" (Acts, 19, 28). Probably at first a tumul- 
tuous procession marched through the streets, swelling 
their ranks by the war cry, " Great is Diana of the Ephe- 
sians!" The mob having been sufficiently aroused 



5* 



* * * a rush was made for the theatre (Abbott on the 
Acts), and when they reached the theatre, for about two 
hours they kept up the cry, "Great is Diana of the 
Ephesians !" (Acts, 19, 34). 

On the first Palm Sunday a vast crowd went with our 
Saviour from Bethany, and they were reinforced by an- 
other multitude from Jerusalem, which met them, and 
the people spread their garments and cut down boughs 
from the trees and strewed them in the way, and that 
great multitude, both before and behind him, cried out, 
"Hosanna to the Son of David!" etc., and this shout 
was kept up for two hours or so, whilst the great pro- 
cession moved on towards Jersualem, up the streets of 
the Holy City and into the Temple, and when Christ 
reached the Temple even the children there took up the 
cry and shouted, "Hosanna to the Son of David!" 
(Matt. 21 ; Mark, 11; Luke, 19; Jo., 12). 

Why were the repeated shouts of praise for tw 7 o hours 
in honor of Diana wrong, and the repeated shouts of 
praise two hours or so in honor of Christ right ? Any 
child should know, although I have not found a single 
Protestant commentator giving the reason. To give 
divine praise to Diana was wrong — w 7 as a great crime — 
because she was a creature or a figment of the imagina- 
tion ; to give divine praise to Christ was right, because 
He is the Creator, 

I shall give a few extracts from Protestant scholars to 
show how Baal and Diana are used as illustrations of the 
Protestant text "Use not vain repetitions," and to show 
how we wicked Romanists are guilty of the same super- 
stitious heathen practices as the priests of Baal and the 
worshippers of Diana. 

" For the heathen practice of incessantly repeating the 
name of God or some single formula, see I. K. 18, Acts 
19 The precept is .. against the superstitious repe- 
tition of a form in the hope of being better heard by God 
which is the point of Elijah's taunt to the prophets of 
Baal." (Com. and a Rev, of the Translation by Bishops 
and other clergy of the Anglican church Ed., by F. C. 
Cook, M. A.) 



53 



COOK : — " For the heathen practice of incessantly re- 
peating the name of God or some single formula, see 
Kings and Acts." 

This is not a heathen practice as I have shown, but a 
most natural and most universal practice, not only of 
heathens, but of Jews and Christians, of men of every 
tribe and tongue and nation, and even of the living 
creatures in heaven (Apoc. iv-8). 

COOK: — "The precept is against the superstitious 
repetition of a form 

I have already shown that it is nothing of the sort. 
Protestants have mistranslated the text. Christ never 
said anything at any time or in any place against the 
repetition of a form. All that Christ or any of the 
writers of the Holy Scriptures said about repetition was 
in praise and commendation of it. 

COOK : — " The superstitious repetition." 

The learned Bishops and others, in this learned Com- 
mentary edited by Mr. Cook, ought to tell us what they 
mean by superstitious repetition, and then let them, if 
they can, show that Catholics were ever guilty of such a 
thing. 

COOK : — The superstitious repetition which is the 

point of Elijah's taunt to the prophets of Baal." 

These learned scholars and their editor can see a good 
many points that have no existence outside of their 
heads. 

It is not the point of Elijah's taunt. EHas did not say 
ironically : Cry oftener, cry longer. He said : Cry 
louder , your god may be a god like one of us men, who 
may go to sleep and need waking ; or who is busy eating 
his dinner or talking. Yell louder to attract his attention. 
Elias does not say you have not been crying often 
enough, he says mockingly, you have not been crying 
loud enough for your god to hear: " And it came to 
pass at noon, that Elijah mocked them, and said, cry 
aloud ; for he is a god ; either he is talking, or he is pur- 
suing, or he is in a journey or peradventure he sleepeth, 
and must be awaked," (Prot. version). 



54 



"The word here refers unquestionably to long con- 
tinued prayers filled with irrelevant unmeaning repeti- 
tions. Thus the prophets of Baal prayed in their contest 
with Elijah." (John J. Owens, D. D., LL. D. :) 

OWENS : — " Prayers filled with irrelevant repeti- 
tions. Thus the prophets of Baal prayed. " 

What was irrelevant in the prayer of the prophets of 
Baal ? Irrelevant ? Could their prayer have been more 
to the point? Was the prayer of Elias more relevant ? 
It was not. Both Elias and the priests of Baal prayed 
alike in directness, in simplicity, in the same form of 
words : O Lord, or O Baal, hear us. The only difference 
in their prayers was that the priests of Baal directed 
their prayer to the sun-god, who could not hear them and 
Elias directed his prayer to God, Who made the sun, and 
Who could and did hear him. 

OWENS : — " Unmeaning repetitions." 

If there is no meaning in the words, O Baal, hear us, 
O Baal, hear us!" neither is there any meaning in the 
words of Elias, "Hear me, O Lord, hear me!" Does 
a prayer that means something, lose its meaning by re- 
peating it ? 

u [The worshippers of Diana] Cried out. The im- 
perfect is graphic ; they continued crying. This reitera- 
tion was a characteristic of the oriental orgiastic rites." 
(Prof. Marvin R. Vincent, Word Studies in the N. T. 
Acts xix. p. 555). 

Was it any more characteristic of them than' of the 
modern newsboy ? I think not. The newsboy can beat 
them at reiteration ; for more hours of the day and for 
more days of the year he will cry " News, News," than 
the worshippers of Diana ever shouted : ' ' Great is Diana 
ot the Ephesians." Reiteration is more a characteristic 
ot earnestness than of orgiastic or any other rites. 

The power of repetition is shown by the Protestant text 
itself. Notwithstanding its ridiculous absurdity, and the 
still more ridiculous explanations and illustrations of it, 
by constant repetition it has come to be regarded even by 
learned Protestants as true. 



55 



There is only one species of repetition that Christ in- 
sisted on, and that is, repetition of our petitions to God; 
in fact repetition means primarily and usually renewed 
petition (re-petition), petition after petition ; the climax 
of absurdity is reached when petition after petition jo 
God is declared vain, for it is this very thing that Christ 
has so strongly urged us to practice ; when our first or 
second or third petition is not answered, we should peti- 
tion God again and again. 

God has given us liberty, perfect liberty, in praying to 
Him ; the Protestant-vain-repetition-restrictions on our 
liberty are nonsensical. We are free to pray to God a 
thousand times a day if we will, we may in our petitions 
even try to imitate the living creatures who, in their 
praises, never rest day or night, but cry out unceasingly : 
"Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord God Almighty, who was, and 
who is, and who is to come." (Apoc. iv-8). 



5« 



CHAPTER XIL 

PARAI<I/EI, PASSAGES. 

Parallel passages are a great help in exegesis, but no 
parallel passages can be found anywhere in the Scriptures 
for the Protestant vain repetition text. However, there 
are three texts which are often alleged as such ; two 
(Eccl. v-2 and Prov. x-19), are found both in Catholic 
and Protestant Bibles, the third (Ecclus. vii-15) is found 
in one of the books of the Old Testament that Protestants 
have excluded from their Bible. I shall take them in 
order. 

Eccles. v-2. — "Be not rash with thy mouth, and 
let not thy heart be hasty to utter anything before 
God, for God is in heaven and thou upon earth : 
therefore, let thy words be few. 

" For a dream cometh through a multitude of 
business ; and a fool's voice is known by multitude 
of words." (A. V.) 

Here there is mention of rashness, of hastiness, of a 
multitude of business and a multitude of words, but 
where is there anv condemnation of a few words often 
repeated ? Where is there any allusion to repetition at 
all, whether vain or otherwise? In the Oxford Teachers' 
Bible, Mt. vi-7 refers to Eccles. v-2, and this text refers 
us back again to Mt. vi-7 and to Prov. x-19, which we 
shall now notice : 

Prov. x-19. — the multitude of words there 
wanteth not sin, but he that refraineth his lips is 
wise." (A. V.) 

Here there is no question whatever of words addressed 
to God, but of words addressed to our fellow men, and of 



57 



the great difficulty of saying much without saying some- 
thing foolish and injurious to our neighbor, and" of the 
consequent wisdom of restraining our tongues. There 
is no connection whatever between this text and Matt. 
vi-7. The third text given as a parallel for the Protest- 
ant paraphrase, "Repeat not a word in thy pra}-er " 
(Ecclus. vii-15), seems at first sight to support the Pro- 
testant text, and it has been so often used for this pur- 
pose and has been so often misunderstood even by Catho- 
lics, that it is worthy of a separate heading The word 
"repeat" was found once in the Protestant authorized 
version of the Old Testament in Prov. xvii-9, "He that 
repeateth a matter separateth very friends." In the re- 
vised version this text is rendered, 11 He that harpeth on 
a matter separateth chief friends." 

In the New Testament the word 1 ' repeat ' ' is not found 
at all ; in the Protestant version, it is true that "Use not 
vain repetitions" still remains, but let us hope that in 
the next revision of the Protestant Bible it will disappear, 
and then the word ' ■ repeat ' ' will not be found in their 
Bible at all. But it is found in our Catholic version in 
Ecclus. vii-15, " Repeat not a word in thy prayer," the 
verse that we shall now consider. 

ECCLESIASTICUS, CHAPTERS VII. AND I,. 

In chapter vii-15, we have 14 Kai me deuteroses logo?i 
en prosenke son" "Repeat not a word in thy prayer." 
"Deuteroo logon" is given by the learned Grotius and 
by Lud. Cappellus and others as equivalent to " Battalo- 
geo " (Critici Sacri 1. c.) ( We have seen, however, that 
they are not equivalent). This is the only text in the' 
Scriptures that seems to offer some support to the Pro- 
testant vain-repetition paraphrase, and it is the only text 
in this connection that presents some difficult}-. The de- 
fenders of the vain-repetition text would be glad to make 
more use of Ecclesiasticus than they do, if it were not 
that by proving that Ecclesiasticus. and their text mean 
the same thing, they would make it appear that Christ 
was quoting from Ecclesiasticus, which would not be de- 
sirable, after having excluded this book from their 



58 



Bibles. I shall give here the whole of the fifteenth 
verse : chapter vii. : 

u Be not full of words in a multitude of ancients, 
and repeat not a word in thy prayer." 

" Logon " means a whole speech as well as one word, 
but it does not matter at present whether the prohibition 
in the verse is against the repetition of a single word, a 
sentence, or a whole speech. 

To get some light on the meaning of the 15th verse of 
the seventh chapter, let us look at the 23d verse of the 
fiftieth chapter where repetition in prayer is also men- 
tioned. The author of Ecclesiasticus is speaking of 
Simon the high priest, and this is how he describes him : 

" He shone in his days as the morning star in the 
midst of a cloud, and as the moon at the full, and as the 
sun when it shineth, so did he shine in the temple of 
God, (Verses 6, 7). 

" When he went up to the holy altar, he honored the 
vesture of holiness. (Verse 12). 

* 1 Then coming down, he lifted up his hands over all 
the congregation of the children of Israel, to give glory to 
God with his lips, and to glory in his name : And he re- 
peated his prayer. . . ." 

This glory w'hich he gave God "with his lips," or, his 
petitions to God for his people, is what he repeated. 

How is chapter vii-15 to be reconciled with chapter I-23, 
where Simon the great and holy high priest, coming 
down w T ith outstretched hands to bless his people and to 
give glory to God with his lips, REPEATED HIS 
PRAYER? 

How is chapter vii to be reconciled with the fact that 
the author himself often repeats his words in his 
prayers? e. g. . . : 

O Lord, father, and owner of my life. . . 

O Lord, father, and God of my life, xxiii 1 and 4. 

Have mercy on us. . . 

Show us the light of thy mercies. 

Have mercy on thy people. . . 

Have mercy on Jsrusalem. xxxvi, 1, 14, 15. 



59 



It is a rule in hermeneutics that the obscure and difficult 
passages in a work are to be interpreted by those that are 
clear. He mentions with approval the repetition of the 
prayer of the hi^h priest, he repeats his prayers himself, 
he cannot therefore be supposed to stultify himself by 
condemning in chapter vii what he practices, and ap- 
proves of in chapter 1. Whatever therefore chapter vii-15 
means, it cannot be a prohibition to repeat our petitions 
to God. 

This text in chapter vii of Ecclesiasticus deserves more 
attention from commentators than it has received. If 
the best MSS. and translations support the present ac- 
cepted reading, its meaning needs elucidation. 

Everyone who has studied the text carefully might 
offer some original explanations of it, but all I have to 
do here is to remove objections. Whatever value there 
might at first appear to be in chapter seven as a prop for 
the Protestant vain-repetition text, is neutralized and 
vanishes, as soon as the twenty-third verse of the fiftieth 
chapter is brought forward. 



60 



CHAPTER XIII. 



A LITTLE) ARGUMENT. 

Three-card monte and the little shell game are played 
in the same way, one is played with cards and the other 
with shells, but they are the same in principle, and there 
are several varieties of the game. The little shells are 
laid on a board (three thimbles or any other hollow ves- 
sels would do as well). The operator shows you a pea or 
the kernel of a nut, or some ether small object, which he 
will slip under one of the shells. You watch him and 
say : " Here, you put it under this one," but when you 
lift it up you will find that it is not under it, but under 
one of the others. Now we shall see how the little shell 
game is played in trying to slip a meaning under the 
word " Batta-logein, " from which vain repetitions may 
be extracted. Protestant scholars tell us that the word 
Batta-logein first means: "To stammer;" and that 
later on it came to mean: "To use vain repetitions." 
At present we have nothing to do with the later mean- 
ing ; the little shell game is played with the first alleged 
meaning of stammering. But before examining the 
game I want to give a few quotations : 

''The original word means to stammer. " (DeVette.j 
u The original word literally means to stammer." (Dean 

Mansfield, quoted by Rev. Jos. Rickaby, S. J.) 
"The original word literally meant to stammer." (Com. 

and a Rev. of the Translation by Bishops and other 

clergy of the Anglican church. Ed. by Cook.) 
"The correct sense of the Greek word (iiterally to speak 

stammeringly) is given in our English version." 

(The Internat. 111. Com. by American and English 

scholars. Ed. by SchafT, ) 



61 



As Hesychius correctly perceived (Batta-logein ) y is to 
be regarded as a case of onomatopoeia . . . and 
meaning properly speaking to stammer." (Meyer.) 

" A word formed in imitation of the sound, batta-logein, 
properly to stammer. " (Marvin R. Vincent, Word 
Studies. ) 

" Formed from a word which reproduces the repeated at- 
tempts of the stammerer, etc. " (Plumtree. ) 

"Probably it (Batta-logein) is as Hesychius suggests, 
an onomatopoeticon after the analogy of Batta- 
ridzein, an imitation of stammering. ' ' ( Lange Trans, 
by SchafT. ) 

" Batta-logeo — Batta-ridzein, to speak stammeringly, 
to say the same thing over and over again. Matt. 
Simplicius." (Liddell and Scott, Greek Lexicon. ) 

Now we are ready to watch the game. Usually it is 
played with three shells, but two or four can be used. 
Here, as we see, from the quotations above only two are 
used, and they are labelled respectively, " Batta-logein " 
and * * Batta-ridzein." The latter, Batta-ridzein is a 
classical word and means to stammer. "To stammer," 
is the name written in its kernel, and this kernel has 
been removed from its little shell and is to be used in the 
game. The other word, Batta-logein, about which this 
whole pamphlet is written, means : To speak much. But 
this meaning (its kernel) has been cut out and thrown 
away, leaving its shell empty, and thus making room for 
the other little kernel, "To stammer," which is to be 
slipped under its shell. 

If we could only have the gentlemen present who 
made the assertions given above, I should like to have a 
little conversation with them somewhat like the fol- 
lowing : 

DBVBTTK : " The original word means to stammer." 

What do you mean by the original word? Batta- 
logein, or some other word that has no existence in 
Greek literature, but which you suppose once existed ? 



62 



MANSFIELD : " The original word literally means 
to stammer. ' ' 

Since you use the present tense we suppose that you 
are speaking of the word found in St. Matthew, Batta- 
logein. Very well ; now, is there one single sentence to 
be found in any book or document ; an inscription to be 
found on any house, or vase, or coin, anywhere, in 
which Batta-Jogein means to stammer? No. Not one. 

ANGLICAN BISHOPS et al. : " The original word 
literally meant to stammer." 

Is not that a rather rash assertion, Your Lordships, 
since not a single instance can be brought forward in 
which it has ever had this meaning ? Are you even able 
to point out a few men, no matter of what tribe or tongue 
or nation, prior to the rise of Protestantism, who ever 
said or thought that Batta-logein meant to stammer? 
No. Not one. 

INTERN AT. ILL. COM. : " The correct sense of the 
Greek word is given in our English version. " 

We have shown that it is not given in your English 
Protestant version. It is. given in the Catholic version. 

INTERNAT. COM. : (Literally to speak stammer- 
ingly.) 

Whether it did literally ever mean to stammer or not, 
that is not its meaning in St. Matthew, and since it 
would not affect the correct meaning of the word (that 
found in Catholic versions, ) I should be delighted to 
grant what Protestants are demanding as its primary 
meaning, if there were even a ghost of a reason for it. 

MEYER : " As Hesychius correctly perceived.' ' 

Hesychius never mentions nor alludes to the word at 
all. It is rather comical to hear that Hesychius correctly 
perceived something about a word that he never men- 
tions. 

MEYER : * 4 It is to be regarded as a case of onoma- 
topoeia." 



65 



Hesychius never said that or anything else about 
Batta-logein. He said it about another word, Batta- 
ridzein. Now we see the little shell game in operation ; 
this statement of his about one word, Batta-ridzein, is 
deftly slipped under the other word, 

MEYER : And meaning properly speaking to stam- 
mer. 

That is the proper meaning of Batta-ridzein. You are 
shoving its meaning under the other word (Batta-logein), 
where it does not belong. 

LIDDELL & SCOTT, Greek. Lex. : Battalogein = 
Battaridzein. 

This equation, which these distinguished lexicograph- 
ers have put between these two words, gives evidence of 
their Protestant education, but not of their scholarship. 
There is as much reason for putting the sign of equality 
between these two words as for putting it between the 
phrases : very logical and very risible. 

LIDDELL & SCOTT. : "To speak stammeringly." 

This is the meaning of the second word, but not of the 
first. Batta, means stammeringly, they would have us 
believe, and logein, as every one knows, means to speak. 
Let us take their equation again : 

Batta-logein = Batta-ridzein 
Taking Batta from both sides we have : 
logein = ridzein 

It will be news for Greek scholars, that these two 
Greek words are synonyms. But this is absurd. Batta 
in both words means the same thing, it means much, as 
we have seen so many times. Batta-logein means to 
speak much and Batta-ridzein means to ridzein (or 
stammer) much. Ridzein means to stammer, and Logein 
to speak. 

LANGE : * 1 Probably it ( Batta-logein ) is as Hesychius 

suggests. ' 9 



6t 



This is certainly a clever way of putting it. Lange 
does not say that Hesychius said or perceived, he is more 
careful and accurate in his statements ; he says only that 
Hesychius "suggests." This is not so flat footed and 
false a statement as those made by the other scholars. 
But would it not be more accurate still to say that John 
Peter Lange, D. D., and some other Protestant scholars 
suggested this, rather than Hesychius. 

LANGE : " An onomatopoeticon after the analogy of 
Batta-ridzein. " 

Lange beats all the rest for cleverness at this little 
shell game ; he does net say that Hesychius perceived or 
mentioned the word, but merely that he gives us a sug- 
gestion of an analogy between the two words, and since 
one probably got its meaning from its sound, and since 
both words are similar in sound and appearance, it is 
natural to infer that they both are also alike in sense, 
and so we have the meaning of one shoved under the 
other before our eyes and we have not noticed the 
transfer, our attention having been taken up w 7 ith the 
words 1 1 probably, " " suggests, " " onomatopoeticon ' 1 
and " analogy." 

This little shuffling or juggling game with words, in 
which the meaning of one is slipped under the other, is 
the best foundation that Protestant scholars after three 
centuries of study have been able to construct for their 
vain repetition text. After having so solidly (!) estab- 
lished the fundamental meaning of ''stammering" for 
" Batta-logein, " they have put it in an etymological hot- 
house, where by careful nursing they think that they 
have been able to develop the meaning of vain repetitions 
out of this original stammer. 

Protestant logic is truly a wonderful thing. 

Kenrtck, In his translation of Ecclesiasticus, gives us the following 
note, under chapter vii, verse 15 : " Vain repetitions, without earnest- 
ness, are to he avoided. Matt, vi, 7. 11 

It is a pity to see Kenrick retailing this silly Protestant nonsense. It 
is a wonder that he never asked himself what these Protestant "vain 
repetitions M were. What are vain repetitions, with earnestness? 
What are vain iepetitions, without earnestness? Why is it that Pro- 
testants never say any thing about "vain petitions? Why is it that 
they have laid such an enormous stress on repetition ? 



6S 



CHAPTER XIV. 

DOES BATTA, (OR BATTA-I,OGEIN, ) UTERAI^Y, MEAN 
TO STAMMER ? 

We are not now searching for the meaning of Batta- 
logein. We know its meaning. It means, to speak 
much. Batta means much, it is a synonym for Poly. 
We are now making a study of Protestant logic, we are 
examining the sophistries by which Protestant scholars 
have tried to bolster up their new meaning of vain repe- 
tition, which they have attributed to Batta-logein ; and 
we are going to the root of the matter, we are examining 
the first meaning "To stammer," which they have at- 
tached to the word, and from which later on they have 
extracted vain repetition. 

There is a classical Greek word, Batta-ridzein, which 
means to stammer. Hesychius said that he thought that 
this was an imitative word, one whose sound indicated its 
meaning. Many Protestant scholars have tried to shove 
its meaning under the other word, Batta-logein, and 
they have tried to make poor Hesyschius responsible for 
what they have done. 

Hesychius thought that the word Batta-ridzein some- 
what resembled a stammer, and that it got its meaning 
from its sound. 

But which part of this word appeared to Hesychius to 
resemble a stammer? Was it Batta, or Ridzein? Let 
us see. 



66 



CHAPTER XV. 



BATTA, BATTO, BAT(T). 

All the codices of St. Matthew do not agree as to the 
spelling of this word. The Vatican codex B has Batta, 
the now generally received reading. But other manu- 
scripts have Batto, the reading preferred by Lachmann 
and Tregelles. 

Other manuscripts still have Bato (only one t). But 
whatever the termination or connecting vowel may be, 
whether a or o, the stem of the word is but one syllable, 
bat or ball ; and it does not matter much, as far as the 
sound to sense argument is concerned, whether there is 
one t or two in this root or stem. 

Now let the reader use his ears and his common sense, 
let him look up all the information that he can find on 
stammering and stuttering, and all the works (unpreju- 
diced by the Protestant text) on onomatopoeia, and I 
shall ask him, if the sound BAT resembles a stammer any 
more than does Cat, Fat, Hat, Mat, Pat, Rat, Sat, Vat? 
It does not. Even if you repeat the syllable, and say 
Bat, Bat, Bat ; how does that resemble a stammer any 
more than Cat, Cat, Cat ; or, Rat, Rat, Rat? 

We have all heard people stammer and stutter. B-b- 
b-boy, w-w-w- what's th-th-th-that ? will do to represent a 
stammer. But any man who can say Bat, bat bat ; or, 
Bat-ta, Bat-ta, Bat-ta, has no stammer or stutter in his 
speech ; but, on the contrary, he has as much fluency as 
could be desired. So ridiculously childish is some of the 
Protestant argumentation used to support their vain repe- 
tition text, that if people fed on very much of such intel- 
lectual chaff it ought to be enough to induce paresis. 

Hesychius does not say that Batta is an onomatopoetic 
word. 

(7 



He says that Batta-Ridzein is, and it was evidently the 
latter, or " Ridzein," part of the word, that seemed to 
him to be an imitation of a stammer. 

What reasons have we for thinking so ? 

First of all, the fact, as we have seen, that there 
is no resemblance between the sound Bat y and a stam- 
mer ; and there is no reason for thinking that Hesychius 
thought so. Secondly, the parallel example that he 
gives us proves that he did not. He tells us that " Batta- 
Ridzein " seemed to him an imitative word, just as " Pop- 
Pudzein," (meaning to chirp, chirrup, or whistle with 
the lips compressed), is an imitation of these sounds. 
Now, which part of " Pop-Pudzein " sounds like a chirp, 
chirrup, or whistle? Certainly not the first part, Pop. 
Pop-pop-pop is not a chirrup or a whistle. It is evi- 
dently, then, the Pudzein part, with its sibilant, chirrup- 
ing or whistling letter Z. And since it is the " Pudzein " 
part of the word, that made Hesychius think that the 
other word, 1 4 Batta-Ridzein," was also of imitative 
origin, is it not then the similar, sibilant, or 44 Ridzein " 
part of the word that appeared to him to have a parallel, 
imitative sound and sense ? There is certainly no more 
stammer in Bat or Batta than there is chirrup in Pop. 

I think that we shall correctly interpret Hesychius by 
saying that the repetitive or vibratory letter 44 R," to- 
gether with the sibilant "Z," make a pretty fair imita- 
tion of a stammer or a stutter, and hence it seemed to 
him that "Batta-Ridzein" was formed from its sound. 
In our English words stammer, stutter, and lisp, the 
sibilant 44 S," with the "t" or "p" following, gives 
these words a somewhat imitative sound of stammering, 
stuttering and lisping. But no one, no matter what his 
language might be, unless his ears have been specially 
attuned by Protestant scholarship, has been able to per- 
ceive an imitation of stammering or stuttering in such 
sounds as Batta or Bat. 

The words of N. Schow to the reader of his edition of 
the Lexicon of Hesychius, are worthy of the considera- 
tion of Protestant exegetes. 44 Hesychii Lexicon, cum 
omnium doctissimum sit omniumque vitiosissimum, doc- 
tissimum et acutissimum interpretem exegit." 



We have then examined the chief foundation that 
Protestants have to support their vain repetition text 
(Mat. vi-/), and we find that it is the sound '* Bat " or 
" Batt, " which they think resembles the sounds or 
efforts of a stammerer. We think not, but if we were to 
grant it, what would follow ? It would follow that the 
word u Batta-logein " (Matt, vi-7), MIGHT have meant 
to stammer, that's all. We could never infer that the 
word actually ever did have this meaning. As a matter 
of fact, we know that in all the Greek literature that we 
possess, it did not. 



69 



CHAPTER XVI. 



BATTUS THE POET. 

Suidas gives a poet named Battus as the probable ety- 
mological ancestor of batta. Whether the word Batto- 
logia was used before this poet Battus was born or not, I 
do not know ; Suidas does not tell us whether he lived 
shortly before his time, or one thousand, or two thousand 
years before him, but since the Greek name Battos was 
about as common as our Dick or Tom, doubtless there 
were several poets of that name, both good and bad, as 
well as several butchers, and bakers and candlestick 
makers, but Suidas, although giving his opinion that 
Battologia was derived from some poet named Battus, 
never said that it meant repetition or vain repetition : the 
only meaning he gives the word is the correct one, 
much speaking. 

The word batta might be derived from some poet 
named Battos, or from Battos a bramble, from Batos a 
measure, or Batos passible, or Bathus deep, or from a 
number of other words, but all these etymologies are 
only guesses ; we cannot say with certainty that batta is 
derived from any one of them, and even if we could, 
that would not determine the meaning of batta in St. 
Matthew ; words of opposite meanings may come from 
the same etymological source. 

One might make a guess that cattle was derived from 
cats, and rattle from rats, and it certainly is about as 
good as the derivation of batta from Battus. However, 
as several Protestant scholars have approved of this ety- 
mological origin, we must give it a little consideration. 

Batta — nugor, deblatero, unum et idem verbum saepius 
repeto ut Battus illepoeta in hymnis suis de cujus ineptiis 
Ovidius in Meta. "Montibus, inquit, erant et erant in 
montibus." (Gualtperius Critici Sacri — cf. also Grotius). 

Modern Protestant scholars reject this derivation, and 
well they might, but before putting it aside, in justice 
to Suidas it must be said, that he never stated that the 
poet named Battus was mentioned by Ovid. The man 
named Battus whom Ovid mentions was a rustic not a 



7o 



poet. Erasmus deserves the credit of having made this 
blunder, and the majority of Protestant scholars three 
centuries ago, took his word for it, and kept on repeating 
his mistake without looking in Ovid to see if what 
Erasmus said was so. Here is what Ovid has to say : 

Apollo neglecting his herd, Mercury steals it — "hides them, driving 
them off to the woods Nobody but an old man well known in that 
country had noticed the theft; all the neighborhood called him Battus. 
Mercury was afraid of him and took him aside and said to him : 
•'Come stranger, whoever thou art, if perchance anyone should ask 
after these herds, deny that thou hast seen them : and lest no requital 
be paid thee for so doing, take a handsome coin for thy reward, " and 
thereupon he gave him one. On receiving it the stranger gave this 
answer. "Thou mayst go in safety. May that stone first make men- 
tion of thy theft, " and he pointed to a stone. The son of Jupiter 
feigned to go away. But soon he returned, and changing his form, to- 
gether with his voice, he said : "Countryman if thou hast seen any 
cows pass this way give me thy help and break silence about the theft, 
a female coupled together with its bull shall be presented to thee as a 
reward." But the old man after his reward w r as thus doubled, said: 
"They will be underneath those hills,' 1 '' and beneath those hills they 
really were. 

The son of Atlas laughed and said : Doest thou, treacherous man, 
betray me to myself? Doest thou betray me to myself? and he turned 
his perjured breast into a stone. (Ovid. Meta. ii. Fable xii. Trans, by 
Henry T. Reilly B. A.) 

The tautology of which this countryman Battus was 
guilty, and which has given him such prominence in 
Protestant commentaries, is found in the following line . 

"In montibus, inquit, erunt," et etant in montibus." 

If our Protestant brethren looked at the line twice they 
would have found that Battus spoke as concisely as a man 
could speak. " They will be underneath those hills " he 
said, not a single word or syllable did he repeat. The 
next sentence : and beneath those hills they were, is a 
statement not of Battus but of Ovid, affirming that what 
Battus said was true. 

In attacking the old church some of our Protestant 
scholars seem to become bereft of their wits. To sum 
up : Suidas, although deriving Batta-logia from some 
poet named Battus, never gave the word any other mean- 
ing than that of ''much speaking," which is correct. 
The Battus mentioned by Ovid was not a poet but a 
rustic, and the words that this Battus used are entirely 
free from tautology. 



CHAPTER XVII. 



B ATT US — KING. 

Suidas, besides giving us his opinion that Batta-logia 
was derived from some poet named Battus, tells us that 
others thought that the word was derived from Battus, a 
Libyan king. Suidas is the first to give us this informa- 
tion. Whether he is merely repeating what he thought 
he found in Hesychius, or is giving us information that 
he got from some other source is not evident, but if his 
information about the King-Battus origin of hatta is de- 
rived solely from Hesychius, Suidas read him carelessly, 
for Hesychius gives no etymology for the noun battalogia 
and does not mention battalogeo at all. But although 
some of those who lived before the Protestant Reforma- 
tion made a guess that Batta was derived from some 
Libyan king who stammered, none of them thought that 
the word batta in St. Matthew meant to stammer, or, to 
use vain repetitions. 

Battos was a Libyan word meaning king ; because a 
certain man who stammered was made a Libyan Battos 
(or king), it is as absurd to infer that therefore Battus 
means a stammerer as to say that because a certain man 
who stammered was made a general, therefore our Eng- 
lish word general means a stammerer. Here is what 
Heroditus has to say : 

Herod. IV. ch. 155. At Thera Polymnestus one of the 
chief citizens of the place took Phronima to be his concu- 
bine. The fruit of this union was a son who stammered 
and had a lisp in his speech. According to the Cyrenaeans 
and Theraeans the name given to the boy was Battus : in 
my opinion he was called at first something else and only 
got the name Battus after his arrival in Lib)^a, assuming 
it either in consequence of the words addressed to him by 



72 



the Delphian oracle or on account of the office which he 
held, for in the Libyan tongue the word '* Battus " means 
a king. And this, I think, was the reason why the 
Pythoness addressed him as she did : she knew he was to 
be a king in Libya and so she used the Libyan word in 
speaking to him. 

Note 4. It is curious that Heroditus was ignorant of 
the name given in the myth to the first Battus before he 

received that appelation from the oracle The name 

was Aristotle. 

The proverb ' 1 Battou silphion," which was used for all 
that was expensive and honorable, is referred by common 
consent to him. (Chap. 159.) 

(History of Heroditus. Eng. version by Geo. Rawlin- 
son, M. A"., London, 1880.) 

This king was known as Battus I., his successors were 
Battus II., Battus III., Battus IV. 

Two foreigners were admiring some paintings at an 
artists' exhibition, one a picture of a rapid river by Ivan 
Romanhoff attracted their attention. The river, its 
banks, the sky, and some animals grazing near by were 
all well done, but it was evident that the river was the 
chief feature of the picture. Under it was the inscrip- 
tion, "A Rushing River.''' One of them asked his 
companion the meaning of this inscription. He knew a 
few words of English, of which river was one, but the 
word "rushing" puzzled him. However, looking at the 
name of the artist and at the scene itself, he answered 
confidently in a moment, it means: "A River 111 
Russia" He thought that a rushing river and a Russian 
river meant the same thing. There is as much founda- 
tion for the identification of rushing and Russian as there 
is for the various Battus origins of batta. 



73 



CHAPTER XVIII. 



WAS REPETITION CHARACTERISTIC OF PAGAN PRAYERS ? 

No, it was not. It was more characteristic of the in 
spired prayers and praises in the Holy Scriptures. How- 
ever, Protestant scholars found it necessary to try to 
prove that it was, in order to defend their new translation 
and interpretation of Batta in Matt. vi-7. The learned 
Grotius hunted up a quotation from Terence, which he 
alleges to prove that the pagans were addicted to repeti- 
tion in praising their deities, and he adds, what is said in 
Terence of thanksgiving is true also of their petitions as 
the hymns of the Greeks show. Here is the quotation on 
which his argument rests : 

C HERMES. "Hold now, do, wife, leave off dinning 
the gods with thanksgivings that your daughter has been 
discovered unless you judge of them by your own dispo- 
sition, and think that they understand nothing unless 
the same thing has been told them a hundred times. 

(Heauton. Act. v. Sec. 1. Lit. Trans, by Henry 
Thomas Reilly, B. A. ) 

Grotius adds, that to say the same thing a hundred 
times is what is meant by Battalogein. We have already 
seen that this is not its meaning. But now for the illus- 
tration from Terence : 

Chremes, a hard hearted father, told his wife Sostrata 
when she was pregnant, if she gave birth to a girl he 
would not support it. The child was a girl, so Sostrata 
had to either kill it or expose it. She chose the latter, 
hoping that some one who would find it and would have 
pity on it. Sostrata put a ring on the child's finger and 
gave it to an elderly woman to take away. Nothing was 
ever heard of her from that day. Several years after a 



74 



beautiful maiden and a friend of hers were visitors at 
Chremes' house. One day when this maiden was going 
to bathe she left her ring to Sostrata, who recognised it as 
the ring that she had given to her lost daughter. So 
here is her daughter back again in her own home. The 
dialogue between Chremes and Sostrata shows us what an 
affectionate way he had of addressing his wife : 

SOS. " Do you remember me being pregnant and 
yourself declaring to me, most peremptorily, that if I 
should bring forth a girl you would not have it brought 
up?" 

CHREM. I know what you have done, you have 
brought it up. 

SOS. Not at all, but I gave it to be exposed 

Alas ! what have I done ? If I have acted wrong, my 
dear Chremes, I have done so in ignorance. 

CHREM. This, indeed, I know for certain, even if 
you were to deny it. that in everything you both speak 
and act ignorantly and foolishly : How many blunders 
you disclose in this single affair ! For, in the first place, 
then, if you had been disposed to obey my orders, the 
child ought to have been dispatched. 

Sostrata tells her husband the whole story, how the 
child was exposed and how she is still alive, and how 
she discovered her by means of the ring. Instead of 
being furiously angry, as his wife dreaded, Chermes has 
no fault to find at the way things have turned out, in fact 
he is rather pleased, for his daughter turns up conveni- 
ently, as a bride for the son of a friend of his. Sostrata 
is overjoyed at the return of her daughter and delighted 
to find that her husband has taken the matter so cooly. 

The discovery of her lost daughter and Sostrata's con- 
versation with her husband about it takes place in the 
first scene of the fourth act of the play. We will skip 
the other scenes and come to the first scene of the fifth 
act. The scene opens with the entrance of Menedemus 
talking to himself and giving his opinion of his friend 
Chermes in the following words : 

" I am quite aware that I am not so overwise or so very 



75 



quick sighted ; but this trainer, prompter, and coacher 
of mine, Chermes, outdoes me in that. Any one of 
those epithets which are applied to a fool is suited to 
myself, such as dolt, post, ass, lump of lead ; to him not 
one can apply ; his stupidity surpasses them all." 

Towards the end of this elegant little soliloquy, 
Chermes enters ; he is supposed to be talking to his wife, 
whom he is just leaving, and who is supposed to be 
behind the curtains; just as Menedemus finishes, he 
enters, saying to his wife within : 

" Hold now, do, wife, leave off dinning the gods with 
thanksgivings that your daughter has been discovered ; 
unless you judge of them by your own. disposition, and 
think that they understand nothing, unless the same 
thing has been told them a hundred times. 

But in the meantime, why does my son linger there so 
long with Syrus ? 

Mendemus catches these last words and asks : 

MEN. 1 1 What persons do you say are lingering ? 

Chremes hearing himself addressed and seeing Mene- 
demus, says : 

CHREM. 11 Ha ! Menedemus, you have come oppor- 
tunely. Tell me, have you told Clinia what I said? " 

and then the dialogue between the two goes on. 

When Sostrata found that her husband Chremes toler" 
ated their daughter's return, it was quite natural for her 
sometimes to give expression to her joy and gratitude, 
even in Chremes' presence, by saying : the gods be 
praised for our daughter's return. A hard hearted iras- 
cible crank like Chremes might tolerate such an expres- 
sion once, possibly twice, but the next time he heard it 
Sostrata would be likely to be notified in his polite way 
of speaking, to have no more to say on that subject. 

Sostrata evidently said "Thank the gods" once too 
often to suit Chremes, and got the rebuke that served to 
get Chremes on the stage again, and which introduces 
his dialogue with Menedemus in a natural manner. And 



76 



this is the best proofs Protestants can find in pagan 
literature to prop up their views about pagan repetition. 
Now how many times did Sostrata say : ' ' Thank the 
gods, my daughter is home again?" (or whatever ex- 
pression she used?) From the line in Terence, can we 
infer that she said it more than three or four times? 
Just ask someone with a snappish irascible nature like 
Chremes to do something two or three times and see 
what he will say : How many times are you going to 
ask me? Do you think I'm deaf? and that you've got to 
ask me a hundred times ? Few persons of ordinary com- 
mon sense will take the exaggerated expressions of ugly, 
angry people, literally. 

Next, Chremes and Sostrata were both pagans ; which 
of the two best represent pagan customs? Sostrata 
several times thanks the gods, Chremes reproves her for 
it and says implicitly : Once is enough to tell the gods a 
thing, do you think they are as stupid as yourself so that 
they understand nothing unless they are told it a hun- 
dred times? 

Picking out a stray sentence here and there (and out 
of its context too), is like the man who went down to the 
beautiful white sands of Yawa beach and hunted about 
until he found a few grains of red sand or brick dust, 
which he brought home and labeled: "Yawa beach 
sand," and all who saw it wondered and said : What a 
funny and ugly place that red beach must be. This 
Protestant style of argument is truly a wonderful thing ; 
supposing that Sostrata or even two or three other 
pagans do something, does it follow that it is a pagan 
custom ? If you read in the papers that two or three 
Americans drank carbolic acid will you say that carbolic 
acid is an American drink ? 

What is astonishing is that just after giving the quota- 
tion from Terence, he gives another quotation w T hich op- 
poses and neutralizes the first. Against this custom 
(which he imagines to exist amongst the pagans, but 
which did not) , he alleges a quotation from Plautus : 
"Let divine worship be done with few words," and he 
also gives other quotations from pagan writers which 
contain nothing at all of repetition, and which are nega- 



77 



tive arguments to show that repetition in prayer or praise 
was not a pagan custom. So much for Grotius' illustra- 
tion and proof of pagan repetition. 

There is no pagan poem that has as much repetition as 
The Bells, or The Raven, or even as Tennyson's Bugle 
song. No pagan prayers had as much repetition as the 
inspired prayers of the Scriptures ; the whole of pagan 
literature can furnish us nothing like the following : 

"I will bless the Lord at all times, his praise shall be 
always in my mouth." Psalm xxxiii. (xxxiv) i. 

"My tongue shall speak of thy praise all the day 

long." Psalm xxxiv. (xxxv) 28. 

c< My praise shall be continually of thee." Psalm lxx. 
(lxxi) 6. 

* ' In God shall we glory all the day long ; and in thy 
name we will give praise forever. ' ' Psalm xliii-9 (xliv-8) . 

"From the rising of the sun unto the going down of 
the same, the Lord's name is to be praised." Psalm 
cxii-3 (cxiii) A. V. 



78 



CHAPTER XIX. 



THE REAIy ORIGIN OF THE PROTESTANT TEXT. 

It is not pleasant to suspect, still less, to accuse our 
neighbors of dishonesty, of blind bigotry, of unwilling- 
ness to hear the other side, of wilfully mutilating or 
mistranslating any text of Holy Scripture, and I will not 
do so, but it is necessary to mention Hatred of the 
Catholic Church as one of the most prominent and most 
common features in the explanations of the Protestant 
text, and I think that it would be impossible to explain 
the origin and development of vain repetition, and the 
amount of ingenious study and manipulation given to 
the word batta, if the anti-Catholic animus, now happily 
passing away, of Protestant scholars be left out of sight. 
No matter how much they disagree about which of the 
several origins should be assigned to BATTA 3 and as to 
exactly what it means after it has been translated, there 
is a universal consensus that it must mean something or 
other that we Catholics do. If the text did not afford 
Protestants an opportunity of attacking the Catholic 
Church, the Protestant paraphrase would never have been 
invented, certainly its existence cannot be satisfactorily 
accounted for, unless anti-Catholic hatred is admitted to 
have had a share in its genesis and in its continued use. 
I will give a few quotations showing the efforts that Pro- 
testants make to prove us guilty of breaking Christ's 
commandment (Mt. vi-7). After having put the Pro- 
testant meaning in the text, the poor old Catholic 
Church is always dragged in as an illustration with some 
remarks about heathenism and superstitious practices, 
false religions, shameful perversion of prayer, etc., etc. 

" The repetitions of Pater Nosters and Ave Marias in 
the Romish Church as practised by them are in direct 
violation of this precept. (St. Mt. with S. S. notes. 
Johnson [Alford]. ) 

" Such also are the Pater Nosters and Ave Marias of the 
Romish Church. Nothing can be more directly opposed 
to this injunction of Christ, etc." (Owen Com. for Bible 
classes and S. S, ) 



79 



"The same usage prevails largely amongst the ad- 
herents of all false religions." (Inter. 111. Com. by Am.- 
Eng. scholars of various Evang. Den. Ed. by Philip 
Schaff, p. 66.) 

N. B. All false religions. 

"To stammer, then to babble or prate, to repeat the 
same formula many times, as the worshippers of Baal and 
of Diana, of Ephesus, and of the Romanists with their 
Pater Nosters and Aves. " (Marvin R. Vincent. Word 
Studies) . 

N, B, See how the pagan worshippers of Baal and 
Diana, and the Romanists are all put together. 

' 4 This method of heathen devotion is still observed by 

Hindoo and Mohamedan devotees In the Church of 

Rome not only is it carried to a shameless extent, but as 
Tholuc justly observes, the very prayer which our Lord 
gave as an antidote to vain repetition is the most abused 
to this superstitious end Is not this just that character- 
istic feature of heathen devotion which our Lord here 
condemns? " (Jamieson, Fausset & Brown). 

N. B. Hindoos, Mohamedans and the Church of Rome 
all classed together. 

1 \ It has often been remarked in corrupt Christian 
churches, one of the earliest and worst perversions of the 
truth is the adoption of the very error which our Lord 
describes as heathenish, and in relation to the very prayer 
here given to prevent it...... a more cogent reason why the 

Christian cannot practise them (i. e. vain repetitions) to 
wit, because they rest upon a grovelling contracted view 
of the divine perfections, etc." (Alexander). 

N. B. Corrupt Christian churches — worst perversions 
of the truth — grovelling contracted view. 

"Vain repetitions — ill. by Roman Catholic repeti- 
tions of Pater Nosters, Creeds, Aves, etc." (Ray's Bib. 
Museum). 

Quotations enough to fill several volumes might be 
given, but these are a sufficient number of samples to 
show the anti-Catholic animus pervading the Protestant 
vain-repetition text and its exegesis. 



8o 



CHAPTER XX. 



SOME NEW PROTESTANT SINS. 

When Protestant scholars decided on vain repetitions 
as a translation of BATTA, it became necessary in their 
commentaries to tell us what they mean by vain repeti- 
tions, to let us know what sort of a sin was condemned 
by the words which they found in their Bibles. It was a 
foregone conclusion that BATTA, or its Protestant trans- 
lation must mean something or other that the Catholic 
Church does or teaches, but Protestant scholars find it 
very difficult to agree in specifying exactly what is con- 
demned by these words. Some seem to think that repe- 
tition in itself is vain ; others think the text is denounc- 
ing unmeaning irrelevant repetitions ; others see super- 
stitious repetition in it. Some can even see a sin in the 
use of synonyms, others in making number and length 
the point of observance, and if one had patience to read 
many Protestant works he might find a number of other 
Protestant sins evoluted out of vain repetitions. One 
thing quite noticeable is that these scholars in giving 
their different opinions about the vain-repetition text do 
not seem to think it necessary to prove their assertions. 
I will give a few quotations and add some comments : 

I. THE SIN OE REPEATING OFTEN. 

ROSENMULLER : " Do not repeat the same words 
often. BATTA means to say the same thing very often." 

GROTIUS : " To repeat the word (Ecclus. 7-15) is the 
same thing that is here called BATTA. 

BEZA : In praying do not babble the same thing as 
the heathen. 

GUALPERIUS : BATTA means to often repeat the 
same word. 

But we find other learned Protestants contradicting 
their brethren and saying : 4 1 The precept is not directed 
against the frequent repetition of earnest prayer. Our 
Lord's own example sanctions the use of long and re- 
peated prayers. (Cook). 



Hi 



GRAY: Bib. Museum in margin. " It is not repeti- 
tion but vain repetition, empty of heart and devoid of 
hope that is here rebuked." 

Repetition and everything else that is vain, if vain 
means "empty of heart, devoid of hope," is con- 
demned by the whole world, still that is not what is 
meant in the text by much speaking. 

If Protestants could only agree as to what VAIN means 
in their text it would be a consolation, but as they cannot 
we have to let each one have nis own way of attacking 
his Catholic brethren. 

OWEN : " However this may be (about the origin of 
BATTA) the word here unquestionably refers to long 
continued prayer filled with irrelevant unmeaning repe- 
titions." 

A man who uses irrelevant unmeaning repetition 
has no sense. It is rather odd to think that our 
Saviour should give such a useless prohibition. But 
does the gentleman mean that the Lord's Prayer, or any 
other prayer loses its meaning by being repeated ? 

COOK: 1 1 The. precept is not against the frequent 
repetition of earnest prayer, but against the superstitious 
repetition of a form in the hope of being better heard by 
God, which is the point of Elijah's taunt, etc." 

If perseverance in prayer, the tireless renewal of 
our request until God is pleased to grant it, is supersti- 
tious repetition, then that sort of superstition is very 
strongly recommended by Christ. This is not the point 
of Elijah's taunt ; the author misses the point as I have 
shown above. 

2. THE SIN OF SYNONYMS. 

"Or do not use long and vain speeches, for the Greek word 
BATTA signifies either the absurdity of and the vanity of repetition or 

of an excessive length AS THE HEATHEN DO, who were 

wont to fill their prayers with abundance of synonymous names which 
they bestowed on their gods, making therein to consist the praises and 
prerogatives of those deities." 

(A new version of the Greek of St. Mat. with a literal 
comment on all difficult passages by DE BEAUSOBRE 
and LENFANT, by order of the King of Prussia. Note). 



82 



To mention " synonymous names" as though there 
were something wrong in synonyms is so absurd that 
it is amazing that any sensible man should put such 
nonsense in print. However skillful the pagans may 
have been in the use of synonyms and repetition, the 
Scriptures can surpass them. Let a Protestant open his 
Bible at the 136th Psalm and read it. The psalm con- 
tains 26 verses. Half of the psalm is made up of 
synonyms, the other half of repetition. In every verse 
we have " an abundance of synonymous names bestowed 
on God, making therein to consist His praises and pre- 
rogatives" 

3. THE SIN OF NUMBER AND LENGTH. 

" What is forbidden in this verse is not much praying 

not praying in the same words but making 

number and length a point of observance, and imagining 
that prayer will be heard, not because it is the genuine 
expression of the desire of faith, but because it is of 
such a length, has been such a number of times repeated. 
The repetitions of pater-nosters and ave marias in the 
Romish Church, as practised by them, are in direct vio- 
lation of this precept, the number of repetitions being 
prescribed and the efficacy of the performance made to 
depend on it." (St. Mt". with S. S. notes. Internat. 
Series. [Alford] ) 

ALFORD : ' 1 What is forbidden is making number 

and le?tgth a point of observance." 

What reasons has Dean Alford to give in support of 
his assertion ? None whatever. His is merely a wild 
assertion without anything in Scripture or common 
sense to back it. If he would only reflect he could re- 
call several of the psalms in which number and length 
and even the letters of the alphabet numbered in order 
throughout their entire length are a very prominent point 
of observance. Eight of the psalms are alphabetical ; the 
first verse begins with A, the second with B, and so on 
until the alphabet is exhausted. In the 119th psalm there 
are 22 stanzas, each stanza composed of eight verses and 
each verse of the stanza beginning with the same letter ; 
the eight lines of the first stanza begin each with A ; the 



83 



eight verses of the second stanza begin each one with B, 
and so on until the alphabet is exhausted. Is there any 
example of divine prayer or praise used in which number 
and length are made such a special point of observance in 
the Catholic Church as in this psalm ? There is no more 
harm in making number and length a point of observ- 
ance in reciting our prayers than in anything else, and as 
it is a help to fix one's attention in other things so it is in 
prayer. 

ALFORD : 4 ' Imagining that prayer will be heard, not 
because it is the genuine expression of the desire of 
faith, but because it is of such a length, has been such a 
number of times repeated." 

Our prayers are heard simply because God wants 
to hear them. He loves us and wants to do whatever is 
good for us. He puts the thought of asking into our 
minds and then grants what He has moved us to ask for; 
But God does not usually grant what we want the first 
time that we ask it, or the second. He wants us to per- 
severe in asking, hence one is right in expecting his 
prayer to be heard because it is a number of times re- 
peated, not however, "such a number of times'" because 
God has not specified the number, nor has anyone else. 
When Peter was in prison (Actsxii-5) the faithful prayed 
for his deliverance ; the first and second and third time 
that they prayed their prayer was not granted, but by 
continually repeating it at last it was heard and Peter 
was freed 

4. MECHANICAL AND MATHEMATICAL SINS. 

PLUMPTREE : "The words (Mt. vi-7) describe only 
too faithfully the act of prayer when it becomes me- 
chanical." 

They describe nothing of the sort, but if so, what 
then? 

PLUMPTREE: 11 The devotion of the Rosary, in 
which every bead is connected with a Pater Noster or an 
Ave Maria does but reproduce the 18 prayers of the rabbis, 
which they held it to be an act of religion to repeat." 

I cannot see the connection between the two or 



s 4 



how one is a reproduction of the other. This author 
cannot see it either, he is merely indulging in loose 
rambling talk. What fault can any sensible man find 
with the 18 beautiful prayers of the rabbis? 11 An act of 
religion to repeat them " ? I hope so, what else should 
we call it ? 

ALFORD : "The repetitions of Pater Nosters, etc., in 
the Romish Church as practised by them are in direct 
violation of this precept, the number of repetitions being 
prescribed " 

What strange insanity sometimes takes possession of 
Protestant scholars when they begin to speak of the 
Catholic Church. 

What does Alford mean by this ? Is a definite number 
of recitations of a prayer a sin ? Is it a sin to say the 
Lord's Prayer three times for example in honor of the 
Most Blessed Trinity, and no harm to say it four or five 
or six times, provided we do not notice how often we say 
it ? How can any sensible man write such stuff. Does 
he think that God has placed such petty restrictions on 
the liberty of his children ? If Alford is right he must 
think that the Protestant text is wrong and should be 
amended to read ' ' Use not a definite number of repeti- 
tions." If a definite number of prayers is wrong why not 
a definite number of other things ? The sin that Alford 
imagined that he discovered in the Protestant text might 
be called the mathematical sin. Many Protestant writers 
have a horror of everything definite in religious matters, 
they seem to think that religion is almost synonymous 
with fog. 

ALFORD: "The number of repetitions being pre- 
scribed." 

The number of repetitions are prescribed in Psalm 
119: Eight repetitions of each letter of the alphabet. 
What then ? When the prophet told Naaman to go and 
wash in the Jordan, the number of washings was pre- 
scribed. Seven times. And until the prescribed number 
was completed he was not cured (iv [II] Kings v-14.) 
So "prescribed numbers of repetitions" have God's 
diiect sanction. 



85 



CHAPTER XXI. 



the lord's prayer impugned. 

Some Protestant scholars perhaps discouraged at the 
hopelessness of agreeing as to what Protestants mean by 
their "vain repetition" text, and thinking that the 
Lord's Prayer is "the greatest martyr," "the most 
abused of all prayers," "the most employed for super- 
stitious ends," &c, &c, &c. thought that the best cure 
for vain repetitions, whatever they may be, was to dis- 
courage the use of the Lord's Prayer by throwing cold 
water on it. The following extracts and comments will 
suffice to show one drift of Protestant thought influenced 
by the " vain repetition " text. 

PLUMPTREE: "How far our use of the Lord's 
Prayer, or of the Kyrie Eleison of the litanies is open to 
the charge of vain repetition is another question." 

"Our use." What ! Protestants breaking their own 
text and prohibition, indulging in vain repetitions? If 
so, how is it another question ? 

McCLINTOCK & STRONG C\CLO. ART. PATER 
NOSTER : " It is claimed by many Protestants that the 
prayer was not intended by Christ as a formula of 
Christian prayer because it contains no allusion to his 
atonement, nor recognises the office of the Holy Ghost 

Protestants condemn the general use of it made by 

Romanists." 

McCLINTOCK & STRONG CYCLO. : "The prayer 
was not intended by Christ as a formula of Christian 
prayer." 

Such assertions almost take one's breath away. Christ 
said : Thus you shall pray, and He did not mean 
the prayer that he then gave His disciples as a formula of 
Christian prayer? The disciples asked Christ to teach 
them how to pray and He taught them this prayer, and 



86 



what He taught them He did not intend to be a formula 
of prayer ? Is this not almost equivalent to saying that 
Christ was a fool ? 

McCLINTOCK & STRONG: "Not intended as a 
formula of Christian prayer, because it contains no allu- 
sion to the atonement nor to the office of the Holy Ghost." 

What prayer is there that Christ approved of and 
heard that mentions his atonement and the office of the 
Holy Ghost? Is every prayer to be an explicit act of 
faith in these two doctrines, why stop short at them and 
not require more ? That prayer of the publican that 
merited such an explicit recommendation from Christ, 
44 O God, be merciful to me, a sinner." The prayer of 
the thief dying on the cross, 44 Lord remember me when 
thou shalt come into thy kingdom." Our Saviour's own 
prayer for His executioners, 44 Father, forgive them^ for 
they know not what they do," contained no mention of, nor 
allusion to, the Holy Ghost. If one wants to find fault 
with anything it is not difficult to manufacture reasons, 
but these reasons given here are so foolish that they 
should never have been expressed. 

Anyone who reads the following comments in the IN- 
TERNATIONAL Series of S. S. notes will not be induced 
by them to have too exalted an opinion of the Lord's 
Prayer. 

4 4 Our Lord did not intend this form of word9 to be 
always of necessity used by his followers for : &c." 

Who says He did ? A handful of heretics many cen- 
turies ago were of that opinion, but who is there who 
thinks so now ? What is the object of proving what all 
admit unless to create in the minds of simple Protestants 
the impression that there are some (the wicked Roman- 
ists of course ) who think it 4 4 always of necessity," and 
thus arouse their prejudices and opposition against the 
Lord's Prayer itself ; if this is not what is aimed at what 
is it ? But let us look at the proofs that are given to 
prove what needs no proving. 

i. 44 He (Christ) nowhere intimates such a design." 
Does He anywhere intimate a design that any other 



87 



prayer should be used ? Does He not repeat this prayer 
probably twice, and is there any other prayer that he 
says anywhere in the Gospels more than once? 

2. His disciples asked Him to teach them how to pray 
and He gave them this prayer, saying " When you pray, 
say : Father, hallowed be thy name, &c." In St. Mt. 
in the Sermon on the Mount, Christ says : "Thus there- 
fore shall you pray : Our Father, &c " 

But let us see some more of the arguments : 

3. "We do not find Jesus or His Apostles in the 
whole subsequent history once using this prayer in their 

devotions." 

That certainly is a tricky argument, which will 
impress Sunday School teachers and scholars and simple 
people, but which ought to disgust a scholar. Earnest, 
honest Protestants should not tolerate anyone who will 
descend to such patent sophistry. We do not find Jesus or 
the Apostles using this prayer in their devotions. What 
prayer do we find them using in their devotions? Have 
we got a list? Do we not find them using this prayer 
twice, and what other prayer do we find them using more 
than once ? What prayer do we find the Apostles using 
in their devotions at all? 

Since Christ gave the Apostles this prayer when the 
Apostles asked Him to teach them how to pray, (L,k. xi.) 
the presumption is that they used this prayer, and w 7 e 
have no explicit mention of any other prayer that Christ 
ever said together with His Apostles. 

Now for another of these delightfully logical argu- 
ments : 

"4. If it had been intended as a ritual for all time it 
would have taught us to pray in the name of Jesus (Jo. 

10. 23-24)." 

This argument is a gem : its author evidently is writing 
for people who have not the ordinary modicum of intelli- 
gence. 

Christ says in the reference given (Jo. xvi. 23-24) 
" Whatsoever ye shall ask the Father in my name he 
will give it you, ' ' &c. 



88 



Moreover St. Paul says (Col. iii-17), " Whatsoever ye 
do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord 
Jesus. ' ' 

In the very first recorded prayer that the Apostles 
uttered a month or so later (Acts i-24) there is 110 ex- 
plicit mention of the address to 44 God, the Father \ in the 
name of Christ.'" The prayer was: "Thou Lord, 
which Juiowest the hearts of all men, shew whether of 
these two thou hast chosen/ ' A. V. 

St. Stephen in his prayer for himself (Actsvii-59) and 
for his persecutors (v. 60) does not explicitly ask the 
Father through Christ. 

Praying (and doing all things) in the name of Jesus is 
praying through and with Him, asking to be heard for 
His sake, alleging His merits, not our own. All Christians 
form with Jesus a mystical body, we are the members, 
He is the head. Our prayers said in union with Him are 
His prayers rather than ours. 

And when we wish to ask the Father to hear us for 
His sake, can our petition be more acceptable to God 
than when we ask for the very things which Christ 
taught us to ask for (in His prayer) and can we put our 
petition in His name better, and can we unite our 
prayers with His better than by reciting the very prayer 
which He taught us, and which opens with words uniting 
us all with one another and with Him our head when we 
say 4 4 OUR Father." 

5. " The early churches did not use it." 

What are the proofs? If not, what prayers did 
they use ? What early Christian writer is there that 
says they did not ? Is there any writer, early or late, be- 
fore the time of the Reformation, that ever made such a 
false aud foolish assertion ? It would be interesting to 
know what reasons the writer has fur making such an as* 
sertion, but he gives none. 

ALFORD : * 4 It must be confessed we find very few 
traces of its use in early times." 

This is not so broad an assertion as the last. 
There are very few traces of anything in the very few 
writings that have come down to us from early Christian 



89 



times, what then ? If we have any trace at all does not 
that show us that it was used ? Have we not more traces, 
and much earlier traces of its use in the Christian assem- 
blies than we have of the use of the Scriptures? 

In the teaching of the Apostles is it not repeated in 
full, and are not the Christians directed to repeat it three 
times a day? (Apostolic Age — McGiffert p. 530). 

THOLUC : 1 ' It does not occur in the Acts nor in any 
w T riter before the third century." 

4 'It does not occur in the Acts, no, but it occurs 
twice in the Gospels, is not that enough ? Is there any 
other prayer mentioned in the Gospels that occurs in the 
Acts ? No. Why then should this be mentioned there ? 

THOLUC: 4 4 Nor in any writer before the third 
century." 

I will let one of Tholuc's brethren answer him : — 

44 The earliest set form of Christian prayer known to 

us is the Lord's prayer It is possible that the Aramaic 

word Abba* (Father) in Rom. viii-15 and Gal. iv-6 
points to its common use in Paul's day. At any rate it 
was generally employed in the second century if not 
already in the first." (Apostolic Age. McGiffert p. 530). 

WILLIAMS : 1 4 As to the early Christians we find one 
of the first of the Latin fathers stating explicitly that the 
leader in the Christian assemblies was accustomed to pray 
according to his capacity." * 

It would be better to give the Father's name and 
the place so that one might look it up. But never 
mind. What does Williams mean? Does he think that 
the extempore prayer-speeches were so popular in early 
times that the Lord's prayer, and all Liturgical prayer 
were practically discarded ? If he does, all his brethern 
will not agree with him. Here is a quotation from Mc- 
Clintock's & Strong's Cycl. 

44 So far as regards the primitive or Apostolic Age, the 

* " Ye have received the spirit of adoption of sons, whereby we cry : 
Abba, Father. (Rom. viii.-i5). 

"God hath sent the Spirit of His Son into your hearts, crying: 
Abba, Father.' 1 (Gal. iv.-6). 



90 



only trace of anything of that kind is the Lord's prayer 
and the Amen alluded to in I Cor. xiv-16 

That men, however, who had been accustomed to 
Liturgical worship under the old system should go into it 
under the new is not at all surprising. 

4 ' The form of prayer given by the Master would be the 
nucleus of these prayers." (Art Liturgy. Early church 
Liturgy). 



or 



CHAPTER XXII. 



ORIENTAL PRAYING MACHINES. 

Travellers tell us that in parts of the East you will 
sometimes see a man seated or lying down, and whirling 
with his hand or by means of a string, a cylinder on 
which are carved some inscriptions. Most of the descrip- 
tions of Praying Machines that we have are written by 
those who regard them as instruments of superstitious 
worship. I have never seen a description by one who 
used them, and who could tell us why he did so — what 
he meant by whirling his cylinder around. It is better 
not to condemn these machines or anything else until we 
are sure of the purpose for which they are used. 

Praying Wheels and Praying Machines are misnomers. 
It is not prayers but praises that are written on them. 
They are not used to petition God or the pagan deities 
for anything, but are used as expressions of praise. 
Praising Wheels is a proper name for them. They are 
sometimes put in public places where every passerby may 
give them a shove, if he will, and set them in motion ; 
sometimes they are kept moving continuously by fasten- 
ing them to water wheels placed in a stream, the run- 
ning water making both revolve together. Sometimes 
these cylinders are filled with books, these have been 
styled by some one Scripture Wheels. William Simpson 
who made a special study of Praising Wheels wittily 
suggests the propriety of calling this latter class " circu- 
lating libraries." If the shooting of fireworks, the con- 
tinual snapping and booming of crackers and cannon, 
the whirling of fire wheels, the waving of flags, are 
proper means of glorifying some national hero, or of 
celebrating some national festival, it would astonish an 
Oriental to tell him that all these motions and moving 
things that we might use in expressing our praise and 



92 



thanksgiving are right, and that the movements of his 
Praising Wheels are wrong. Whether it be the waving 
of a flag or the whirling of a Praise Wheel, as far as the 
motion goes, they both are indifferent. To find out 
whether they are good or bad, we must find out their 
meaning and the end for which they are done. 

If the revolution of the cylinder be an outward con- 
comitant expression of the inward desire accompanying 
it, that God may be continually glorified, and if it be an 
expression of the wish that we might be able to sing His 
praises as often as the wheel revolves, no fault can be 
found with it. There may be something in it that pleases 
the Oriental imagination, and until we find out what 
their object is in using it, we should abstain from con- 
demning it. It may be an absurd and superstitious 
practise worthy of more contempt than it ever has re- 
ceived, but it is well to get more information before in- 
dulging in vehement denunciation. I like to see the 
words of Holy Writ, whether they be words of prayer or 
praise on the walls of our churches. If these words were 
put on a revolving cylinder it would remind me of the 
revolving advertising signs in show windows, and I 
would consider it most inappropriate and in the very 
worst of taste. However there is nothing intrinsically 
wrong in the motion of a cylinder accompanying one's 
prayers any more than there is in the motion of an as- 
cending cloud of incense, which is a symbol of prayer, 
and which accompanied it, by God's own command, 
or in the motion of the flames of the seven flickering 
lamps which burned in the Holy Place. Catholics should 
be careful not to condemn any custom unless they are 
certain that they know what it means and that it is 
wrong. We should leave the invention of new sins to 
our Protestant brethrern, and should rather rejoice at 
all good things done, no matter when, where, or by 
whom, and as for indifferent things we should allow 
every one the liberty to do them, or do them not, as he 
wills. 



93 



